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Decorating with Color in Context
You might have a favorite color like shocking pink or moody blue, but is it the right shade for your apartment? Decorating with color takes a little finesse and the trick is to choose color in context. This means taking a few important factors into account before you start painting walls and buying furniture.
Decipher your decor
First, you need to take a good look at your existing decor. Are there decorating color combinations that you tend to use frequently? What do those colors mean to you and how do they affect you psychologically? Do they energize you or help you relax?
The answers to these questions can help you choose new color in context with the environment you have already created in your apartment. For example, if you decorate with soft tones like beige, gray-blue and moss green, suddenly painting one room magenta may seem jarring and out of context with your overall decorating color scheme. Unless you want to completely rework your look, choose colors that are lighter or darker versions of your current decor or select complementary colors.
Observe your overall style
Apartment decorating is about more than just color scheme. It’s about creating an overall style and impression — way beyond “I like beige.”
Try imagining a location where you dream of living, and decorate your apartment in a similar way. If you love the beach, your context would be a tropical paradise with warm brown sand, sparkling blue water and vivid green palm trees with accents of colorful wild parrots. Close your eyes and visualize the colors you see in that environment. Or simply pick up a beach travel magazine and pull out a few pages.
The colors you see in those visuals become the palette to choose from when you decorate with color in context. Beyond the beach, you could try other popular apartment decorating styles like Mountain Lodge, Mediterranean, Scandinavian, 1950s Modern or whatever you dream up. Once you choose a theme for your home decor, it’s easier to know what colors to select when decorating.
Start to see the light
Finally, remember that not all color is created equal. Lighting can have a big impact on how rosy your red appears and how cloudy your gray looks. Did you know that color on a wall with windows looks more muted than it does on the other side of the room? Decorating colors can look drastically different if they have sun shining on them or if they are in a room with no exterior light.
When you are choosing paint colors or even color for large pieces of furniture, get a color sample or fabric swatch and see how it looks in different areas of the room and in different lighting scenarios. Check out the color during the daylight and at night when you have lamps turned on. You may also want to consider how lighting changes seasonally. Colors that look bright in the summer may look dingy during the winter.
Decorating with color in context doesn’t always make or break a color scheme, but it’s certainly worth considering before you invest time and money into painting your kitchen lime green or buying that big orange sofa!
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