Finally moving into a house soon! Gonna need ideas

[Chops]

So a friend of mine is going to rent a house to us that’s been in his family (his wife actually grew up in it) since 1952. The house was built in 1951, has somewhat dark wood floors throughout, and the rooms are a bit smallish, but luckily no popcorn ceilings! All of the ceilings are I guess you would call knock-down finish, and painted white. The house is only 1150 sq ft, but…

The family room is roughly about the same size as the room my system is in now, except it’s a perfect rectangle, 8’ or 9’ flat ceiling, and is not an open floor plan. I only briefly walked through the house and I can’t be too sure, but I would say that this particular room is maybe 10’ wide and 20’ long. It has a door in the right rear corner, a door in the front left corner, and a typical “door width” opening into the kitchen in that same front left corner, but on the side wall if that makes sense.

But before I get ahead of myself with how I’m going to position the system, speakers and subs, I need to talk about colors. My friend is giving us free rein on color choices on the walls throughout the house, and since this room is “my” room (as well as the one-car garage), I want to choose a couple of nice, classy colors for in this room, with one wall being an accent wall.

Keeping in mind that the wood floors are a somewhat dark-ish natural wood color, the rooms are somewhat small, and keeping with modern times, I want/need colors that will make the room look as large as possible yet still inviting and relaxing.

What I’m thinking is something like a dark gray accent wall behind the speakers where the TV will be mounted, then a light gray on the remaining walls with white trim. There’s no crown molding in the house, but I might see if he’ll let us add some. Just a simple design. Any will help I think.

Maybe some other color than just a dark gray accent wall. Maybe one of those dark-ish blue/grays or something.

Please let me know what you guys/gals think, what choices you’ve gone with in your own listening rooms, what other suggestions you might have. Please post up pics of your rooms as it’s always easier to visualize the colors with actual pictures.

We have to make up our minds in the next week or two since I’ll be buying the paint and we will all be helping with the painting with him and his wife.

We are so excited to finally be moving into a house. This apartment living for the past 10 years is for the birds. Now we’ll have our own place, no annoying noisy neighbors stomping up and down stairs, slamming doors and blasting crap music on crap stereos at all hours of the day and night, no more fighting for a parking spot, no more fear of coming out in the mornings to find our cars dinged or scratched.

At the house, we’ll have nice friendly neighbors, a lot of whom I already know, a decent size front and rear yard with a large open school field behind the house, so no nosy neighbors behind us. We can’t wait!!!

Oh, and did I mention it has a GARAGE?!

Anyway, many thanks in advance for all of your awesome help and suggestions! We look forward to hearing from you!

[netspecht-2]

I’d lean more to earth tones to match the flooring. There are three dozen or more shades of tan/brown/beige. The brown can be thought of as boring, but I think of them as neutral and non-offensive.

The Color Psychology of Brown

I have no idea if the above link is mumbo jumbo or not, but there probably some studies out there on color and relaxation. Colors are also used in a medical sense during chromatherapy.

[Chops]

That would normally be fine, but for the past 10 years, we have been in two different apartments, both of which have had tan/beige walls.

Yes, even though this house has wood floors, I (we) want to get away from browns as far as paint is concerned. And my girlfriend loves earth tone colors.

[dawkinsj]

Charles

Go to Behr.com and use their color tools to mix and match colors on walls. Bigger the monitor the better.

[jlm]

Neutrals stay in fashion longer. Light colors make the space seem bigger. Let the GF pick the colors, only hold a veto vote if it offends you. Note that in general women see color better than men and for domestic bliss let her “win” this point in the relationship.

My picked a yellowish light cream for my man cave. It adds a sense of warmth in a normally cold basement.

Like the idea of an accent color on one wall, way better than wallpaper. Dark colors tend to make the room seem longer in that direction, so try to go darker on one of the long walls and lighter on the short walls.

Crown moldings will age an older house and accentuate length of the walls. And once you start, where do you end with it? Unless your crew is very handy and all the walls/ceilings are straight and true, getting crown moldings right can be very labor intensive.

[scotte1]

If making the room feel bigger is a priority, then relatively neutral, earth tones with a complementary dark-colored front wall is good trick to give you a sense that the room is deeper than it is. As someone suggested, use the paint manufacturer color wheels, etc., which recommend combinations. I think I would tire of a monochromatic color palette pretty quickly unless the walls were well covered with various room treatments, art, sconces, etc. Have fun.

Food for thought: HT Color Scheme Article

[tmurray1]

We have Sherwin Williams Perfect Greige in our house and I like it a lot. It looks good with brown or gray. We use darker shades from the same palette for accent walls and other rooms.
https://www.sherwin-williams.com/homeowners/products/SW6073-perfect-greige/6073#/6073/?s=coordinatingColors&p=PS0

[Elk]

I need to color calibrate my laptop monitor.

[tmurray1]

Me too. The colors on the Sherwin Williams site don’t match what is on my walls.

[Chops]

So any other suggestions/pics of color combinations?

[Chops]

Guess not

[Chops]

I really thought this thread would have been a bit more lengthy than this. Oh well.

[Elk]

It will get longer as you continue posting.

[Chops]

Yeah, because that was a useful post…

[jlm]

Audiophiles is one of the last demographics I’d ask for color advice. Most are male, who don’t perceive colors as well as females and obviously we’re more focused on sound than sight. And left to their own devices, many men will go for adolescent sports motifs and thrown out bar room paraphernalia. And most males go for geometrical themes rather than color based decor.

[Chops]

Not all audiophiles, but whatever.

[Elk]

As useful as your recent posts and, more importantly, they all work together to lengthen the thread.

[Schroedster]

For the sake of getting back on topic…

First, some important questions. Do you have pictures of the shade of wood? What about furniture? Are you bringing your current furniture or will you be buying new stuff? If you’re bringing your current furniture, do you have pictures you could share? What about art? Same thing, pictures are helpful.

Personally I love this light minty shade:

[drybeveridge730]

chops,

I originally painted my media room with a very neutral gray to minimize color perception issues with my plasma flat panel, specifically Benjamin Moore Dior Gray Matte (2133-40) with a lighter variant on the ceiling, Sidewalk Gray Matte (2133-60). Since painting originally, I decided to go with a darker variant on the front wall behind the TV, speakers and equipment racks in order for everything to blend better and “disappear” visually. The front wall is now Black Jack Matte (2133-20).

Dan W.

ps - adding a 2nd image with a more accurate exposure to illustrate how the equipment and TV blend into the wall. Also a bit of the ceiling to show how the three shades compare.

[Chops]

Sorry for the late response. It’s been a bit busy lately. When I’m not at work, I’m at my father’s, or my brothers, or at the new house working on it. At some point we settled on some colors. The wood floors are getting some repairs and patches done on them, then when painting and other things get done, the floor guy will be back to do a full sanding and refinishing, so the floors will be much lighter than they are now. After we’re moved in, we’ll pull one door off at a time and refinish them as well.

Anyway, here’s a few pics of the progress…