After spending time helping Jordan paint her new house with a lovely color called Cotton Grey, I decided to freshen up our foyer with the same color. Cotton Grey is a Behr color, but I had mine mixed by Sherwin Williams. While everyone else in the world was putting out Christmas decorations in December, I took a day and painted my share of the project, and now it is finished.
The previous wall color was Buckram Beige by SW. You can see a little bit of it there on the left in Mr. Right’s office. There was nothing wrong with the color. In fact, we are leaving it in his office. Also, the walls were in good shape, but I just wanted a change. No one, including me, sees a huge difference in the overall appearance of the foyer. However, it does look a little fresher.
I also painted the upstairs hall, and that involved the stair well. One week our neighbors were having some rooms painted, and I snagged their painter for a few minutes to give me an estimate on what he would charge to paint just the stair well area. His price was right, and he knocked it out in no time flat. He painted one coat when he had finished work for the day at our neighbors, and then he did the final coat the following morning before he resumed painting at my neighbors’ house. It was a win-win for all.
The biggest and most noticeable change in the foyer is that I took down the gallery wall and moved it to our basement. I am on the lookout for an antique Turkish kilim runner that will go with the kilim rug at the front door. I felt that the rug and the mixture of art on that wall on the right would be just too much, and I am happy with that decision.
I received a new oil painting for Christmas and hung it beside our clock.
The painting is called “Singer” for obvious reasons. My grandmother had a Singer sewing machine like this one, and I was thrilled to receive it as a gift from our son and daughter-in-law.
I also added a forest scene under another existing painting. The top painting is by a local artist, and I painted the bottom one. Since the gallery wall is gone, the space looks a little more open. There is still plenty of art in the space, and I can always switch paintings around with art that is in other parts of the house when the mood hits.
We’ve painted every inch of our Dutch colonial fixer upper — shades of grays with 1 palest of blue bath — but my favorite would be the Black Magic (Pittsburgh Paints) doors. I love a good contrast! May I just say that your forest painting is stunning? Speaking of contrasts! You captured the dark forest floor with the sun-kissed canopy, + the almost misty far background is stunning! Oh, + that office with the dark accent wall + matching cabinets — I’ve never seen that, + it looks striking! 😉 TY for sharing your pics!
Kay, thank you so much. That was the first painting I ever did.
Looks great!
Josie, the painting is perfect there, too.
Funny you should mention the joys of hiring out painting. We just had our master, hall and entry hall painted last week. In years past we have always been DIYers, but not so much recently. It was worth every penny to have two painters knock this out in 4 hours. Then they cleaned everything up and put the furniture back, including putting an enormous flat screen TV back on the wall. All I had to do was make the bed. Writing a check never felt so good!
I didn’t mind writing out that check, either, Jewell!