The Color on the Chip Is Not the Color on Your Wall

The most frequently experienced problem in residential painting projects is when homeowners pick out their preferred colour from a paint store, put it up on their walls and then a week or two later realize the colour doesn’t look anything like what was expected.

No colour change has occurred. The light has.

The most important single variable in determining color appearance of paint is lighting, and lighting varies during the day, across seasons and between rooms within the same home. The soft white appears clean and calm in a north-facing living room, but can appear blue-grey in a darker hallway. A warm beige that is comfortable in an east-facing bedroom may look almost orange in the afternoon sun in a west-facing bedroom that receives full Okanagan sun.

Knowing how light and colour will interact before you pick a paint means you do not end up repainting a room that may technically have the colour you picked but that doesn’t look anywhere near like what you had in mind.

Start With the Direction the Room Faces

The first most important piece of information to have before choosing a color is the orientation of the room’s windows to where the natural light will come in during the day.

North-facing rooms

North-facing rooms have indirect light that is cooler and bluer during the day. Colors that appear neutral in a brightly lit store will show cool undertones in these areas. Blues and greens may seem colder than they actually are. The undertone is grey, and sometimes slightly purple, for whites. Warm colors are better in north-facing rooms because they neutralize the cool light in these rooms, rather than complement it. Creamy white, warm grey, soft terracotta and earthy colors work well.

South-facing rooms

Rooms that face south are lit by steady warm sunlight throughout the day. These rooms are forgiving. Most colors perform fairly close to their actual appearance in the shop as the light is balanced and plentiful. Cool colors such as soft blues, greens and crisp whites are a great choice in south-facing rooms where the warm light helps to tone down the sharpness of the colors. The saturated colours also tend to stand out here too and not look muddy.

East-facing rooms

Rooms facing east are light and warm in the morning and then cooler and darker in the afternoon and evening. Warm colors are a good choice for rooms that are primarily used in the morning as they make use of that golden morning light. If it’s a room you will use more of at night time, think about how this color will look under artificial lighting, not just during the day.

West-facing rooms

Rooms with a western exposure are the other way around. They may be dim in the morning and slightly cool, then they are bathed in warm late afternoon sunlight. Those colors that are selected for the morning can be drastically different at 5 pm in the evening. In these rooms, testing is very important.

Undertones Are Where Most People Go Wrong

All colors have an undertone, and it is the secondary color that lies underneath the primary color and only shows when the color is applied to a wall and affected by the light in the room. A beige might have pink undertones. A grey may have green or lavender undertones. A white color can be warm or cool, depending on the yellow, pink, or blue undertone.

In some lighting situations, undertones are more apparent. Cool Northern light brings out the cool tones of a color. Warm ones are intensified by the warm afternoon sun. A color that appears to be perfectly neutral in a balanced, well-lit showroom can give off unwanted tints and shades after a few days on your wall during different times of day.

The best way to avoid this before committing is to test. Not swatches. Real sections (at least 1 foot square) to be painted on the wall. Check them in the morning, midday, and evening using any light in that room that isn’t natural light. If the color withstands all those conditions and you still like it, you have found your color. It is much better to discover that it will change in a manner you did not anticipate before you paint the entire room.

How Artificial Light Changes Everything After Dark

Natural light is a small part of the equation. Most people spend a great amount of time in their home indoors and under artificial light, and the type of light bulb can make a huge difference in how a paint color appears.

Warm, amber colored lights from incandescent bulbs will complement warm tones and will also mellow out cooler tones. A cool grey will often look almost purple under incandescent lights. A warm beige can also be a golden colour.

There are many LED bulbs with different color temperatures. The bulbs marked warm white are around 2700K, and act like an incandescent bulb. Daylight bulbs (typically 5000K to 6500K) can create a bluish-white hue, making warm colors appear flat, but cool colors will appear vibrant and crisp.

Use the same bulbs that you’ll install in the finished room if testing paint samples. If the room is completed with warm white LEDs, testing a colour in a daylight type bulb will give you incorrect information.

The Okanagan Light Factor

Summerland, Penticton, Peachland and West Kelowna have the highest levels of natural light, particularly during the summer months. For much of the year, in the South Okanagan, the intensity and direction of the sun is greater at high elevation than on the coast of BC and the interior. Colors might look dark and rich in cooler climates, but can look washed out in direct Okanagan sunlight.

This is usually done by selecting a darker, more saturated shade of color for exterior walls and exterior surfaces, and a lighter, more subdued shade of color for walls and interior spaces where the sun’s influence matters.  It also implies that a color that’s tested in October will appear differently on the same wall the following July. When choosing colors for the room in which you are about to live for years, it is important to take this into account.

A Few Practical Rules That Actually Help

• Test on the wall, not a chip. The size of the chips and their distance from the actual context of light in the room make them too unreliable to be used.

• Allow sample time. Review it for two or more days before making a decision.

• Consider the permanent features of the room. The light reflects on the floor, counter, cabinet, and furniture as well as the wall color. A cool grey color will read differently with a warm wood floor. The white cabinetry will make a colorful kitchen wall appear differently.

• If in doubt, go lighter. The second coat or a darker trim will add depth more easily than to lighten a color that feels heavier than expected on the wall.

When to Ask Someone Who Has Done This a Few Thousand Times

Choosing a colour is one of those things which seems simple until you’re in a room with 17 paint chips, all of which look exactly the same and, for some reason, are all wrong. For more than 20 years, Kary and the Evolved Contracting crew have been assisting homeowners throughout the South Okanagan with exactly this. If you’re having a problem with a room or you’re doing an entire interior job and you need all the colors right before something has to go on the wall, contact us! If you’re ready to talk, give us a call at (604) 966-4449, send us an email at evolvedcontracting@proton.me, or visit evolvedcontracting.ca.