The Color Recession
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Here’s a great article in the Atlantic about the proliferation of gray, beige, and greige in houses, interior and cars.
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/08/colorless-gray-products-houses/688174/
Or here https://archive.is/M47pS
And an antidote, San Francisco houses painted by Dr. Color:
https://drcolor.com/gallery/We don’t live in an HOA neighborhood and this neighborhood was built before the gray-invasion. So the housing exteriors around here are not super uniform. Nothing shocking, but enough variation that it makes the neighborhood nice IMO. Also our house (1990) has the original (and very nice/pretty) wood trim around the windows and very nice wood doors etc., and the walls are a nice warm, off-white color. Then we get our bursts of color through furniture and artwork (especially in my piano room). But we don’t have any “accent walls” or dramatic interiors.
BTW when I lived in Japan and bought a car new for the first time, here’s the Subaru I thought I would buy:
And here’s the Subaru I actually bought:
The car we have now is that boring gun metal gray color
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Infiniti now has a gorgeous emerald green out. I like a sedate navy blue-gray too. Mazda has a red out that's almost candy apple red from the early 60's customs.
“I refuse to answer that question on the grounds that I don't know the answer”
― Douglas Adams -
Infiniti now has a gorgeous emerald green out. I like a sedate navy blue-gray too. Mazda has a red out that's almost candy apple red from the early 60's customs.
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Infiniti now has a gorgeous emerald green out. I like a sedate navy blue-gray too. Mazda has a red out that's almost candy apple red from the early 60's customs.
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Timely topic. The construction guys finished some exterior repairs this morning and I'm now considering exterior paint colors. My house is a cape, 24' x 36'. I want something historic even though the house is not historic. My thoughts for a while have centered on the idea of a mustard color (there are so many different ones, from nauseating to restful), but that has recently changed. I'm now thinking about dark blues or greens. Ideas?
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FYI, my house:
This was the sort of mustard I was interested in, but now I'm not sure it's what I want to see when I look at the house:
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Always liked a yellow house with white trim.
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The big front gable on your house lends itself to a third color.
Maybe a color lighter than the base color that would reduce the visual weight?
Edit: like this but not gray:
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Always liked a yellow house with white trim.
@Steve-Miller I really like that yellow house with white trim!
@bernard I think that's maybe why I didn't like the yellow house pic you posted. It's not the color, but the fact that the trim and everything is the same color. Also I don't think that red door works with.
One issue for your house is matching the color to your lovely deck. I wonder if yellow wouldn't work with the deck, whereas green or blue might.
Hmm, this is hard!!
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Yeah, yellow I like. Mustard not so much. It was very popular in interiors in the 90s and 2000s. That and gold. Now they look like avocado green and harvest gold.
I love yellow and white on a more traditional house like the one Steve posted.
Ours is now Woodland, a Sherwin William green. Looks gray in this pic but it's not. We finally like it after being New England Red and then some awful taupe color.
“I refuse to answer that question on the grounds that I don't know the answer”
― Douglas Adams -
Yeah, yellow I like. Mustard not so much. It was very popular in interiors in the 90s and 2000s. That and gold. Now they look like avocado green and harvest gold.
I love yellow and white on a more traditional house like the one Steve posted.
Ours is now Woodland, a Sherwin William green. Looks gray in this pic but it's not. We finally like it after being New England Red and then some awful taupe color.
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Yeah, yellow I like. Mustard not so much. It was very popular in interiors in the 90s and 2000s. That and gold. Now they look like avocado green and harvest gold.
I love yellow and white on a more traditional house like the one Steve posted.
Ours is now Woodland, a Sherwin William green. Looks gray in this pic but it's not. We finally like it after being New England Red and then some awful taupe color.
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No, still the same. The only side I completely redid was the south and that was in 2001. We tried to get the insurance to replace it with Hardie board after the 2014 hail storm, but no dice. We did get a new roof, that paint job and a new garage door, all of which were needed.
There's no end to it. We replaced the sidewalk this spring, now our radon readings are a little higher than I'd like. Waiting for an average over a month or so.
The association just cut down a huge old oak tree that was shading my south side and there's more heat upstairs. Have a guy coming to look at reflective insulation in the attic.
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I like the yellow.
My house in Missouri is stained Salt Blue. It is a sort of coastal fishing town blue.
When it was built I heard people were driving into the country to see the blue house. It is outside a town of 3500 in Missouri. I know they will do almost anything for entertainment. -
Always liked a yellow house with white trim.
@Steve-Miller I like yellow houses with green shutters, but on other people's houses.
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The big front gable on your house lends itself to a third color.
Maybe a color lighter than the base color that would reduce the visual weight?
Edit: like this but not gray:
@Steve-Miller Interesting thought, but I don't know if my house is big enough for base color, trim color, and yet a third color.
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@Steve-Miller I really like that yellow house with white trim!
@bernard I think that's maybe why I didn't like the yellow house pic you posted. It's not the color, but the fact that the trim and everything is the same color. Also I don't think that red door works with.
One issue for your house is matching the color to your lovely deck. I wonder if yellow wouldn't work with the deck, whereas green or blue might.
Hmm, this is hard!!
I think that's maybe why I didn't like the yellow house pic you posted. It's not the color, but the fact that the trim and everything is the same color. Also I don't think that red door works with.
Having everything the same color is a bit more historical, I think. I'm fond of it because of that. My house was completely brown when I bought it and it was too much, too dark, looked like a solid cube. Works better with lighter colors I think.
Re: the red door, that's definitely historical. You'll notice that it's not a finish door, but just an outside "shutter" sort of door. Many early homes have these. In fact, the house down the road--built in 1799--has one. (It's up for sale again! I wish I could buy it. https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1038-N-Groton-Rd-Groton-NH-03266/86756718_zpid/?utm_campaign=zillowwebmessage&utm_medium=referral&utm_source=txtshare
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@Steve-Miller I really like that yellow house with white trim!
@bernard I think that's maybe why I didn't like the yellow house pic you posted. It's not the color, but the fact that the trim and everything is the same color. Also I don't think that red door works with.
One issue for your house is matching the color to your lovely deck. I wonder if yellow wouldn't work with the deck, whereas green or blue might.
Hmm, this is hard!!
One issue for your house is matching the color to your lovely deck. I wonder if yellow wouldn't work with the deck, whereas green or blue might.
Actually, that picture is old and was taken right after the deck was built. I've since stained it. At the moment I only have this subjective view of the deck railing in it's current color. I think it's called Redwood (floor is not stained):
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