Black is a Neutral

photo credit Fernando Bengoechea

I believe black is one of the most dramatic colors you can paint a room.  Combine that with my point of view that black is a neutral and you can probably understand why I lean towards dark colors.  As we approached the final stages of our remodel and it became time to start the paint selection process, I lobbied hard for a black room. C and I had already agreed on the concept of grey, grey blues, and grey greens.  I was pushing for Farrow and Ball’s dark Down Pipe black for at least one room. I lost that battle. However, it’s just paint so I still may get my way someday. 

I guess I need to remind him of our first house in Atlanta.  It was a little intown bungalow.  I painted the living room and dining room the darkest grey I could find.  In fact, it was so dark grey that it was almost the color of a chalkboard.  The rooms had dark wood floors and bright white ceilings and white gloss trim.  It was very chic.  However, I did have a woman I worked with, when she first saw the house, ask, “Why do you like to live in a cave”?  It bothered me that she didn’t like it, especially since she was someone I thought of as a great champion of taste and style.  But that was years ago and after working together for a long time, I realized that even though she did have good taste if other people's choices were not identical to her's she deemed them wrong. Now I realize she was just a b*t@# and I should not have given her point of view any thought.  In fact, I guess I really didn’t give it too much thought.  The rooms stayed that color until I moved out of the house and to this day I still like it! 

So there!



photo credit Grey Crawford



photo credit Grey Crawford

photo credit Ira Montgomery

photo credit Pieter Estersohn

photo credit Pieter Estersohn

photo credit Roger Davies

photo credit Roger Davies

photo credit Simon Upton

photo credit William Abranowicz

photo credit William Waldron