Deciding factors in a colour choice

Press, 1 July 1985, Page 16

Deciding factors in a colour choice

Kitchens, dining rooms, bedrooms, and colour accents feature in this week’s questions from readers. One reader has a monochromatic room and would like help with colours for curtains. It would help me if readers could give me the following information: • What way does the room face (is it warm or cold) • An approximate size of the room

• The height of the ceiling • Your own preference of colour • If it is a child’s room, the age of the child and a little about his or her character.

Qi would be grateful for some ideas for a colour scheme for our renovated kitchen and dining room area, shown in the plan below. Both rooms receive morning sun until about midday in winter and 2 p.m. in summer. The dining room is inclined to be fairly dark, with a nine foot stud, and has rimu panelling two thirds of the way up the wall, with wallpaper or paint above. The kitchen cupboards will also be rimu, with cork tiles on the floor in both rooms. I would like to use matching curtains (or blinds) in both rooms. Suggestions, please, for curtain fabric, wallpaper and or paint colours, and bench top colour. I would very much like to use a vivid daffodil yellow as the main colour, with white and touches of either blue or green. I am not fond of patterned wallpaper in kitchens, but would like it in the dining room, perhaps with matching the curtains. I have also considered plain wallpaper with a matching frieze. Uncertain, Christchurch.

AGolds and yellows are just coming back into fashion, so finding you a bright daffodil for your curtains and wallpaper has not been easy. I suggest a natural colour for your bench top because yellow is not a good colour on which to prepare food. It can, if you are colour-conscious, be ideal for dieting as once you prepare the food you have no wish to eat. Try For-

‘Living Space,’

Prudence Kothberg

by

mica for bench top in Papyrus leather grain, wallpaper for the dining room, Moondance, Wild Meadow 1841, which has a white background with soft gold flowers and green leaves. The kitchen walls would be light and bright in pale wattle. Have a Roman blind in the kitchen, and curtains in the dining room, in Windermere Gold.

Paint ceilings and any woodwork white.

Qi am redecorating a spare room 3.28 x 2.56. This room has only one window, 4ft 6in wide by 7ft high, and it faces south.

At present the room has a white, stippled ceiling and plain cream carpet. I have chosen the Actil, Design Shadows, for the two single beds. Could you please advise what to do the walls, including wardrobe doors. G. R., Christchurch.

Aas the room is not large, I would be inclined to paint the walls and woodwork in the same colour. Use enamel for the woodwork and a latex paint for the walls. The Shadows design is quite strong in the red, white, and black. Therefore I would use Resene Spanish white. This is a warm colour with enough strength for your white ceiling and cream carpet.

Ql would like some advice on what sort of curtains to put in our lounge and living room. The lounge is 14ft by 12ft, with

exposed dark brown beams.

Enclosed you will find the carpet sample and wallpaper for both rooms, and sample and colour for the suite. The wall unit is dark brown. I would like the same curtains for both rooms as they are separated by glass doors. The lounge windows are 10ft on one wall, and 12ft on the other, meeting on the corner. The drop is Bft in both rooms. The living room window is 10ft wide. M. 0., Chch.

Al do like your choice of carpet, wallpaper, and furniture. You have a monochromatic room with the dark, natural Berber with flecks of gold and tan, lighter, textured wallpaper, and a caramelcream suite which verges on the old-gold. Keep to the monochromatic colour scheme with your curtains, and bring the colour in with paintings, cushions, and orna-

ments. I advise either Argiel Windermere, colour Champagne. This has a cotton-satin appearance but is a 100 per cent polyester. The colour is subtle as it is slightly into the old-gold. The other choice could be a paler colour in a self-striped polycotton, Sifir Putty. Either would be attractive. You have a choice of accent colours — greens, tans, blues. Go ahead, “the world is your oyster.”

QThank you for your reply to previous questions. Further help is needed, as I omitted to mention that I required advice on wallpapers for our sons’ bedrooms.

Al recall that your sons’ rooms had the same design in different colourways. I would have the same wallpaper in both boys’ rooms, and suggest Moondance, Kinnesand 1850. Good luck with your decorating.

Qpiease could you help with ideas for redecorating a bedroom. I have enclosed a plan of the room, and also a snippet of the carpet. I had thought I would like floral drapes with tones of pink and green — not hard colours. I also need help with bedspreads or duvet covers, and wallpaper to complement it all. D.W., Christchurch.

A Your natural carpet will take any colours, and is a wise choice. For your curtains, James Dunlop’s Paradis, colour Green, would be attractive. This is from the Taco de France collection and has a soft green background with tree trunks, green leaves, pink berries, and tiny pink birds. The colours are not hard.

For your bedspread, use either the same 'fabric or a plain, matching, pink cloth, Ronald Griffiths, Argiel Windermere Old Rose. Thank you for your very

good plan, but unfortunately you did not show which way the room faces. If it is a warm room I suggest a matching green, Vision, Thai Silk 2370 wallpaper, and for a cool room, the soft pink number 2372.

Qcould you please suggest colour and fabric for cushions in my lounge, which is open-living? The wallpaper is plain striped, the carpet light fawn with a brown and gold fleck. My suite is brown, and I have one soft gold, recliner chair. The drapes throughout are slate blue, and the same blue covers my dining chairs and a small antique chair in the entrance hall.

On the carpet I have two Persian rugs in slate blue, cream, gold, rust and navy. I have tried to use the soft gold where possible, in the table lamp, china, and other accessories. At present the cushions are plain gold

and blue. M.S., Rangiora.

AThe slate blue velvet you have sent me is an Z attractive colour. It is ” very soft, with some green in the blue. My mind went at once to pure silk for your cushions. I like the change in texture, and silk is so subtle. Wilsons Orien- < tai Silk, colour French ‘ Blue, is a toning of the Z velvet, with a little more “ life. Colour red is really a brick tone, and the two ’ combined -will give you a ' new look. >; Keep your soft gold, as it will go well with these * colours. It is a good idea “ to change your cushion colours, as this gives a change. It is not too expensive to do every year or so. 'Z

If you have any queries on home decorating for Prudencee Rothenberg, address them to “Living Space,” Home and People Page, “The Press,” P.O. Box 1005, Christchurch. Queries can only be answered in this column.