Paint Post #1

The last time we left you guys we had just closed on the house and begun working on it. We are still a little in shock that we own a house together. It feels like everything over the last five years has been leading up to this and we feel very fortunate to be able to fix up, what we think, is such a great house. But at the same time we wish we could just do it like The Sims and click and drag walls into place or paint everything with the swipe of a mouse. Maybe one day?

So this might be a little premature seeing as we haven’t gotten the roof replaced or the new windows in, but our minds are already racing with paint color ideas. Exterior, that is. Initially we wanted a greenish gray or a taupe gray. From the very beginning that is what we wanted. So over the weekend we made a few trips to our local Ace Hardware to get some paint samples. We agreed upon Benjamin Moore paint because literally every color we loved had BM under the picture and we have always heard great things about it, too, so naturally.  

The first trip was for the grays. We got Gray Huskie, Chelsea Gray, Winter Gates, and Dovetail (by Sherwin Williams but matched to BM), and a paint color we didn’t have to buy because we already had it was Rockport Gray by BM. Here’s what they look like on the side of the house:

1. Dovetail
2. Chelsea Gray
3. Gray Huskie
4. Winter Gates
5. Rockport Gray

We knew right away we loved one and two and something about four and five we liked but felt it was almost too icy. And number three we agreed right away we weren’t crazy about it. We decided to paint a good portion of that side of the house, to the left of the front door, Chelsea Gray since we both loved it. We honestly forgot what that middle color is which means we obviously didn’t choose that one to paint the house 😉.

After we painted it, though, something felt off about it. We liked it in the small area it was on but not so much once we started painting more of the siding. It just kind of felt blah and it didn’t really pop like we hoped it would. So it was back to the drawing boards. But last night it hit us-what about white? PJ had mentioned it a while back but somehow we got on the greenish/gray and forgot about the white. We plan on doing a charcoal gray metal roof and we think white would look great with that and maybe some grayish-black shutters. PJ was up all night researching colors and narrowed it down to a few whites and some more grayish-taupey ones. So another trip to Ace and eight more sample cans later and we were in business. Our favorites were China White by BM and Monterey Taupe by James Hardie. Below is China White:

This is more of a creamy white but still beautiful nonetheless. What we love about white is it’s classic and will still be in style 50 years from now. We wanted a color that looks good with the red brick walkway that leads up to our little brick porch and white pretty much goes with everything. Plus we asked ourselves WWTKD? Aka What Would The Kennedy’s Do? And the answer is more than likely 99.4% go with a white house. Probably, anyway.

But, (yes with us there is always a but) we also wanted a cozy, sophisticated color. Which brings us to Monterrey Taupe by James Hardie.

It had the perfect tint of gray, taupe, brown, and green that we were looking for and it honestly looked good with the red brick. We are thinking black shutters would look great with this color but weren’t entirely sold on the charcoal gray roof with it. Something about the two really dark colors together didn’t seem right to us.

And so here we are. Completely torn over these two colors. We love the timeless look of white but the cozy feeling of the taupe. Also our house looks a hot mess right now with at least six different colors going on but you gotta do what you gotta do.

All of this to say, we have no idea which color to choose. Want to help us out by taking this poll? Please?