Does anyone want to show me gray interior walls?

[Deleted]

Like, in living rooms and bedrooms? DH is only comfortable with neutrals, and I cannot stand beige, so that means grey. We've been fighting over wall colors since we moved in (our house was built in 2006, so imagine how much beige there is . . . So, so, so much beige) but I finally got to a point this weekend that I said I would cave on color as long as we could get rid of the beige.

We have a decorator but she doesn't choose paint colors (Obnoxious, but I appreciate that she knows her strengths). I may hire someone to choose colors, but would prefer not to because how hard can it be to choose grays?

[LoveTrains]

Haven't a bunch of people used BM revere pewter? It's a greige.

[isabel]

Jun 7, 2015 22:23:26 GMT -5 elle said:

Like, in living rooms and bedrooms? DH is only comfortable with neutrals, and I cannot stand beige, so that means grey. We've been fighting over wall colors since we moved in (our house was built in 2006, so imagine how much beige there is . . . So, so, so much beige) but I finally got to a point this weekend that I said I would cave on color as long as we could get rid of the beige.

We have a decorator but she doesn't choose paint colors (Obnoxious, but I appreciate that she knows her strengths). I may hire someone to choose colors, but would prefer not to because how hard can it be to choose grays?

Actually, I think greys can be pretty tough. They can trend toward blue, purple, beige, and a lot of other hues. I think they're one of the most frustrating paint colors because they have so many other notes to them. I'll post a picture of our bedroom in a minute. It's neutral, sort of grey, sort of purple. I think it's a really pretty color.

[thejen626]

This is when I use Pinterest! Then I make a "board" with inspiration photos and I let DH give me his opinions between the 5-6 photos I like.

[mcfelix]

We have SW agreeable gray everywhere and I'm happy with it. Here's a pic I have on my phone of the nursery in progress and DH's office.

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[sarahbear]

Amazing Gray by Sherwin Williams is a great neutral.

[isabel]

This is without natural light. I think it looks a bit more purple during the day.

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[shell24]

Gray is the hardest damn color to choose. I had 9 samples on my wall before going with Benjamin Moore Whale Gray. It's a darker shade but I love it. It's in our master bedroom.
I have 2 dark dressers and 1 yellow accent piece. My bedding and draperies are white, so it helps balance the paint color.

[elleblue]

Gray is a great choice but it can be tricky. My first question for you would be (and this will probably sound odd to many, lol) but do you prefer grey or gray? Grey to me has green to blue undertones and gray has blue to purple undertones.

[Deleted]

@booby mcfelix isabel - I love all those! Great inspiration. Our bedroom has purples, so I really like the bedroom @booby pointed and mcfelix's bedroom, and will definitely check out SW Agreeable Gray.

The living room Booby posted is also not dissimilar from ours - we have white built-ins surrounding our fireplace in the middle of the room - so that's great inspiration. Though our kitchen -- which has BEIGE granite counters and maple cabinets -- adjoins the living room, which means this could get expensive of the grey doesn't work with the BEIGE granite.

God save me from the millennials. Humans and houses. I am going to be ridding this house of beige for a decade.

[Deleted]

farmvillelover, I love your bedroom. So crips and pretty.

Is that bed from West Elm? We have its twin in our guest room.

[Deleted]

Jun 7, 2015 22:48:42 GMT -5 @pnkbride said:

How about a darker beige? Like a Khaki? Or even a light brown? My kitchen is painted in Valspar WV42002 Coffee, and I love it! We have lots of wood trim and those are painted in a off white. It really turned out beautiful. Those are definitely neutral colors.

Coffee I could handle. Khaki, no. I detest beige. We have lived in two homes built in beige's heyday and it just looks too dated for me now. I could live with browns, but I just cannot do beige anymore. Too much for too long.

[allhis]

We have several grays and greiges throughout our house and Mindful Gray (SW) is definitely my favorite. It's the most "true" gray wo weird undertones. It goes with everything. We have dark hardwood and cream trim, but have several friends who have used it after seeing it in our house and it works in any situation. Highly recommend.

[Deleted]

isabel, do you remember which color that is? I would like to swatch it in our master. It looks like it will coordinate well with our bedding.

[verycontrary247]

I just painted like 90% of the interior of my house Behr Pewter Mug and love it.

I'll pip in a minute.

[allhis]

The only pictures I have of our walls, painted Mindful Gray, aren't great b/c we just moved in so decorating sucked, but you get the idea.





ETA: Don't judge furnishings - I've changed absolutely every single thing over the past 5 years. But the gray has remained the same b/c I love it. It is the perfect neutral imo.  

[fuckyourcouch]

Jun 7, 2015 22:35:23 GMT -5 mcfelix said:

We have SW agreeable gray everywhere and I'm happy with it. Here's a pic I have on my phone of the nursery in progress and DH's office.

We have the same everywhere. I don't have pics handy but it's a great color

[SKP82]

I don't have a suggestion for a color, but I do recommend you get these to sample swatches in different rooms.

Paint can look soooo different room to room depending on the lighting. You paint these plastic sheets, then they stick to the wall. That way you get an idea of how that color will look on your wall without 10 different paint swatches on the wall to cover up. We got them at Home Depot.

www.sureswatch.com/product-info-paint-color-visualizer/

[Deleted]

We have gray walls, but they are light gray, so I guess they are actually neutral.

[wambam]

No matter what I did, true greys never looked grey in my house. We went with a color called sackcloth which looked beige on the chip but ended up very grey in my house.

ETA

[mcfelix]

I completely agree that lighting can change how the paint looks. Also I don't think agreeable gray is a true gray - I think it has a bit of beige or taupe in it, which I wanted bc much if our furniture has beige in it because our last house was painted SW Tony Taupe. So that could be a good thing considering your concern about the cabinets.

We have built ins around our fireplace (one side is not finished though). I'll PIP when I go downstairs if the sun isn't glaring in.

[aprilsails]

We had to contend with matching to a beige-cabineted and blue countered kitchen for 4 years before we did our reno (the joys of 1998). I am also not a beige person, and had a really difficult time finding a good neutral for the great room (open kitchen, dining room and living room).

We wound up going with Benjamin Moore's Barren Plain, which honestly is not a very exciting colour when you look at it, but is highly effective in spaces where you want to lean grey while still being warm enough to play nicely with the beiges (and blues). I loved how it changed our space. I also needed a very pale wall colour since all of our windows in that space are North-facing. (Not my house in photo)

I now have some other grey since we thankfully ripped out the blue and beige kitchen last year. Unfortunately I have no idea what it is.

[cville]

Jun 7, 2015 22:45:23 GMT -5 elleblue said:

Gray is a great choice but it can be tricky. My first question for you would be (and this will probably sound odd to many, lol) but do you prefer grey or gray? Grey to me has green to blue undertones and gray has blue to purple undertones.

Huh? Gray vs grey is just commonly used spelling in the U.S. vs England.

Anyway, I have a gray that leans a little purple in my bedroom and love it, but I wanted it to be cooler and wouldn't use it for a common living space.

But I must stress that brown is almost impossible. I wanted a deep chocolate/coffee in my kitchen and dining rooms, tried 100 samples and ended up with something I hated after two weeks and looked like dirt/excrement. I finally (after four long years) just changed it to a warm off white and am in LOVE (SW Restful White). So check out so not quite whites too.

[mcfelix]

Sun isn't helpful this morning but here is our family room.

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[peachykate]

I use Mindful Gray and the shade lighter, Repose Gray, all of the time during renovations. I'll take some pictures tomorrow when I go back to a house that was just painted last week.

[irishbride2]

I don't have a pic right now but we used Seattle Mist (Benjamin Moore). Its grey but with warm undertones so depending on the lighting and accents it at times reads beige. It could be more of a compromise for you two.

[lightbulbsun]

I used Tempered Gray by Valspar in my living room, and I love it. 

[wambam]

Jun 8, 2015 5:45:09 GMT -5 mcfelix said:

I completely agree that lighting can change how the paint looks.

This times a millionty.

I live in a very wooded lot, so most of the time the greys ended up green. And when it's not green, it's purple. Suuuuuuuper purple.

Ugh, I'm still bitter that none of the greys worked for me.

[wambam]

TR - They're photographing that way, but IRL, they look greyer.

[Elsa]

I'll just ditto the others- you have to swatch it. I think we tested 5 grays in our LR, 7 in our bedroom and fucking 14 in our entryway. They look totally different depending on the room, time of day, light, etc. we ended up with a light gray in the LR and kitchen, a medium gray in the master bedroom and a gray/blue in the entryway. I love them all