Design Inspiration

Lately, I've been considering updating the painting in my house. I've lived here for over 11 years now, so it's just time for some changes, and paint is definitely going to be cheaper than finishing the basement (though that's on the "To Do" list for sure).

Jess had mentioned once that she looked for colour palettes on Pinterest for card making, so I had a look. Some had links to looking for inspiration from other fabrics or things you have, so I'll probably head in that direction. I already used my kitchen chairs (some of the seat pictured above) as inspiration for some accent paint around my pantry door, so I'll now probably use some of the neutrals in it to have some continuity throughout the house.
*Note: The two paint sample strips on the chair were to figure out the best colour to use and my design friends said I could actually use any of those colours. I went with the top left for the wall as I thought it was a little more vibrant than the bottom row.

Aaaanywho, I ended up pinning quite a few colour palettes as I figured I'd need them at some point anyway in my crafting. And I discovered that I had quite a few from Design Seeds (http://design-seeds.com/), so I explored that site more and thought I'd share.

http://design-seeds.com/home/entry/petaled-hues5

What I liked about that site is that it gives you an image and pulls colours from it. Then if you like a particular one, you can click on it on the right side under "see similar colours" and it will take you to other colour palettes that use similar colours. For example, I clicked on the top-right greenish colour and got to eight different palettes that might work, depending on what overall feeling your going for. http://design-seeds.com/search?hex=cfccb0

So this is all well and good, great for card making, maybe some clothing design, inspiration for choosing colour options, but this doesn't really help you buy the paint for the walls.

But wait! I found another website that will help with that. EasyRBG http://www.easyrgb.com/?X=SEEK

This will take computer colours and turn them into the paint colour names from different companies. You'll need either the RGB values or the hex code of the colour. The beauty of the Design Seeds site is that if you hover your mouse over the colour, the hex code will pop up. It's also the end code of the webpage you follow if you click to see the similar colours. So for the greenish colour noted above you can see the end string is "cfccb0".

I know my local paint store sells Benjamin Moore paint, so I entered "cfccb0" in the colour code, chose the "Benjamin Moore Color Preview" as my color collection, and voilà! It gives me the names of four optional matches that Benjamin Moore produces. The centre block is the colour I entered and the four smaller ones around it are the options. In this case, it came up with Guillford Green, Soft Fern, Abingdon Putty, and Carrington Beige.

So now just head to the store, grab those colour samples and decide where your project is headed.

Translating computer screen colour to real life may take a little trial and error, but here's some help to getting the ideas from your head onto the walls!

~Lisa