Unutterably Silly Help for a color challenged designer wannabe!

[Verencat]

Hello dear friends.

As I've been mentioning over and over again thanks to my one track mind, I moved last week.
In my new wonderful apartment, I have a double room that stands for a lounge-living room and an office-library. They both have to be color coordinated, and I wanted to use in the lounge part a buttery beige, and in the library part a light milk coffee brown, so both the rooms would be warm and cozy and slightly seventy-ey. Nice new landlord bought the paint, but the brown turned out to be khaki brown, kind of what you could find in baby diapers, so that is not going onto my walls. Beige is fine, and I'm keeping it, but am thinking of using less of it than what I first planned.

Anyway, I went to the hardware store and found so many beautiful colors I now find myself to be stuck in indecisiveness. I like brown, but I like green too, and blue, and purple... I would honestly probably go for a deep red, but the only limitation I have with choosing a color is this: it has to fit with an orange carpet upholstered vintage round lounging chair I stole my mom.

So, question is this, what would you do? What color would you chose? What inspires you?

edit: after browsing samples, I now have narrowed the choice for a poll! (wish I could link the actual colors though)
reedit: possible to see the colors with the virtual fan deck.

[DixieGal]

Yellow. The sunniest yellow you can find.

[Verencat]

That's already the kitchen color...(and will it look good when I'm done!)

[dreams]

Seventies huh? very light green was also a wall color along with the bright yellow. (my parents STILL have it)

I like very light wall colors --- bone (a light white-beige) twilight blue (very light blue) and others, then I add color with the decorating. Paintings (you can tell what I like by the paintings I've used as avatars), tablecloths, pillows, and other little things bring in the color and I can easily change colors by changing these.

Good luck choosing colors. That's the fun part.

[Verencat]

I'm so torn!
I love the seventies color, but greens are tricky and can easily backfire on you. I got stuck for a year with a turquoise green that looked passable when The Ex chose it (he said he wanted to have his say in nesting, pfft!) but made me nauseous everytime I walked in the room, so I think this option is now closed. I think I'll go with brown and maybe a purple wall in the living room area...or all four... but then every room would be so dark...

[Patricia]

I would be tempted to sponge (or stipple, or colour-wash) some of the beige over the caca-brown wall.
This would link the two colours. Alternatively, just go for beige throughout and add colour via the furnishings and pictures.

[Moejoe]

Originally Posted by DixieGal

Yellow. The sunniest yellow you can find.

Yellow is also the colour associated with madness and psychosis

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Yellow_Wallpaper

Gutenberg download: http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/1952

[zelda_pinwheel]

i would paint only one wall with any of those darker / brighter colours, as an accent ; this way you risk less to get overwhelmed by it and start to hate it.

don't forget to think about the colour of the light where you live, because this will change the colour of the paint. in the north the light is probably quite blue, but if you will be in these rooms mostly at night you should take into account the colour from your lamps (depends on lightbulbs and lampshades). for instance, warm brown colours under blue light look like... what you said.

[pshrynk]

I voted ferret brown and stem green, but SUmkIII doesn't let me out of the house without a once over, so don't pay attention to that.

[Moejoe]

I voted Stem Green but I'd actually go with Pale Vista from the colour chart (green is a relaxing colour, perfect for when you're reading) Contrasting colours, well I'd grab a still of a picture that puts you into a specific mood, like the below one:

an interior from Rudolph Schindler's King's Road House (California)



Then run this through the brilliant online colour palette generator here http://www.degraeve.com/color-palette/ which produces the below palette and is a good starting point for any accessory work, rugs, cushions and the like you'll use later on (its supposed to be for computer design reference but it works just as well when you're desiging in real life).



EDIT: WARNING!! DANGER!! APPROACH ALL NON-NATURAL BROWNS WITH CAUTION! Just look at what Brown did to the 70's design ethos (worryingly it's creeping back into design now)

[DixieGal]

Originally Posted by Moejoe

Yellow is also the colour associated with madness and psychosis

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Yellow_Wallpaper

Gutenberg download: http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/1952

I BS'ed a senior paper on that story. Barely had to read it to get the A. Crazy woman goes crazier, thinks everyone is out to get her, turns out they have confined her in order to protect her, and she has a small problem with yellow wallpaper and the woman who is trapped behind it. Made it a bunch of feminist crap about her being trapped in her role as the helpless woman, since that seemed to be the way the wind was blowing in that class. If it had been another professor who seemed political, for instance, my paper would have been about womens' suffrage and the implied longing for the freedom to vote and have a say in their own futures. Basically, I just coasted that last year.

[vivaldirules]

I was thinking along the lines of something like this. I'm sure you're dad would help you with whatever work might be necessary to make that happen.

[Verencat]

Hold that thought

[Moejoe]

Originally Posted by DixieGal

I BS'ed a senior paper on that story. Barely had to read it to get the A. Crazy woman goes crazier, thinks everyone is out to get her, turns out they have confined her in order to protect her, and she has a small problem with yellow wallpaper and the woman who is trapped behind it. Made it a bunch of feminist crap about her being trapped in her role as the helpless woman, since that seemed to be the way the wind was blowing in that class. If it had been another professor who seemed political, for instance, my paper would have been about womens' suffrage and the implied longing for the freedom to vote and have a say in their own futures. Basically, I just coasted that last year.

Sounds like a lot of my Masters Degree experience, until they alllowed me to finally discuss some contemporary Japanese literature, then it was a whole lot more fun

[Peverel]

ok I am saying nothing - I am ravingly colour blind and tend to stick with safe colours like magnolia and white . I tried to drift away from that once and ended up with a lilac and yellow kitchen with black woodwork. Trust me not good.