colours to paint

what colours would you suggest for a minimalist look in
1 Kitchen wooden round table, metal legs and chair metal legs back
2 Living room sofas black, tv cabinet and coffe table glass, dash of red in a glass vase.
I would like to have one wall different. Also is colour washing out in a modern minimalist design? thanks

Re: colours tp paint

Hi Jane,

First of all, imho forget the colour washing! That is a dated look and is more suited to a french country style approach (but I wouldn't recommend it even then).

This is very subjective as what colours you paint your walls is very personal! When you say you are going for a minimalist look, I assume you mean modern and not over fussy. A true minimalist would just paint all the walls brilliant white!

Think chocolate (ie warm dark brown) for the feature wall is amazing when paired with a lighter taupe colour and this may work well in the kitchen. It is particularly effective if you have downlighting and some fantastic artwork on the walls. High drama and definately not fussy. My sister in law painted her kitchen walls a very dark green and has slate on the floors, and it looks very sophisticated.

Have you considered wall paper for a feature wall in the livingroom? Maybe paper the wall behind the sofa (assuming this is facing the fireplace) is best. I think when you paper the wall that the fireplace is on, you can quickly tire of the paper as you are looking at it the whole time - assuming your tv is next to the fireplace. You can then put a large mirror over the fireplace which will reflect the pattern of the wall paper so you get the effect without the busy-ness. Since you like red and black, maybe you could look at striped papers, say grey and black with a thin red line now and again. For the other 3 walls, pick up one of the colours from the wall paper but keep it light and neutral. I know some posters will say, paint one wall red, but I think that is overdone and will look dated very soon.

Hope it goes well - it sounds like you will have a lot of fun with your decorating!

Thanks for your reply. Will take into account but have to say brown and shades of cream etc out, brownphobic. Wallpaper not my thing either. Yes I want a modern look but probably not as far as painting all walls white. I wantminimalism with a litle spark of creativity too. Thanks again

Jane Doe, maybe calling what you're after "minimalism" is misleading - to yourself as well as other posters. The fact that you mention colour-washing is a bit of a give away there!

You don't mention the style of the cabinets in your kitchen, and in that room they have a significant impact on what you can do with the walls as they are so visually imposing.

Your living room furniture sounds mimimalist in quantity, but again you don't mention the style - is it modernist furniture? Leather or fabric suite? Are your glass coffee table and TV stand metal or wood framed? Do you have any soft furnishings such as curtains, rugs, cushions? And what about art on the walls? All these details will give more clues as to what your personal style actually is, and if you can look at what you already have and decide what you do and don't love then it should give you a better idea of what it is you're trying to achieve.

Having said that, you can't go wrong with painting all the walls white to begin with. White is certainly not un-creative (many would say minimalism is non uncreative either) it's a great background for showing off other colours and textures, and it's also easy to paint over if you decide on that later.

I know you are adverse to wall paper, but think about making a HUGE statement with something like this:
[broken link removed]
Would be amazing on one wall in the living room and you wouldn't need any other artwork in the room, just bare walls.

LadyJane said:

I know you are adverse to wall paper, but think about making a HUGE statement with something like this:
[broken link removed]
Would be amazing on one wall in the living room and you wouldn't need any other artwork in the room, just bare walls.

Click to expand...

That is nice. I have a sofa like the one in front of it but mine is black. No cushions.My tv table is glass and metal as is the coffee table.

Sorry if i mislead anyone. I should say i want to be minimalist but also creative hence my wanting to paint one different colour.Also tere are financial boundaries to work within

Iwas almost sure that color washing was not minimalist i used to think it was a good idea in old houses where the walls were not good/flat

I also thought of, where a colour changes between the open plan kitchen living room, not having it a straight line, sort of jagged. Is that mad?I once read that john lennon was painting his apartment and ran out of paint and just got a different colour and carried on