marcolo, using color isn't about you or your tastes. It's about the individual owners taste and what they like, what makes them happy! People have the freedom to do what they like, unless they live in an HOA.

Pal made a comment earlier about people here posting that they love color, but on other posts tell posters to use neutrals for fabric, furniture, etc. with a "pop" of color. I think that most of the posters here are not the same that post the use of neutrals elsewhere. I know I don't comment on those posts, since I don't do neutrals.

Some like Anne D, post both neutral and color suggestions.

I've attached a picture of my house, the house is a light gray with a lavender tone ... and the doors and shutters are royal purple. My Realtor has told me to paint over the purple before I list my property in the next few years. I said I would, but he wanted black and I told him no, that I wold do a royal blue. I can't live with black.

My barn is the royal purple too ... I did tell him that I am NOT re-painting the barn ... whoever buys this property (20 acre small farm), will have to live with or paint the barn themselves.

I painted it like this, because I like it. It makes me happy! I could care less what my neighbors think. (Though most really like my house.)

No, I think Marcolo has a point about taste. It's not purely personal, there are societal, cultural and socioeconomic norms of what is considered "good taste" and what is considered "bad taste", and also norms about who recognizes it as such. It goes back to the Potter Stewart comment about pornography:

"I shall not today attempt further to define the kinds of material I understand to be embraced within that shorthand description ["hard-core pornography"], and perhaps I could never succeed in intelligibly doing so. But I know it when I see it, and the motion picture involved in this case is not that."

pamghatten - I think your home with the purple trim is adorable! In my book, that is not a very garish house at all It's cute and has some personality. I even like the green/chartreuse historic home Marcolo posted, though it sounds like it doesn't really fit in with the neighborhood ;-)

There are a few bright homes in my neighborhood (suburbia in CA, so the lots are small and the houses close together) but mostly neutral homes. I like neutrals or colors that seem current, or at least classic. The worst offender, IMHO, is the salmon pink house with dark salmon pink trim...and really it's only bad in the late fall when their large tree turns red and clashes for a few weeks.

I think most people go with neutral because it's safer. Repainting is a rather large expense. We just painted, and even though I thought I'd like to have a green house (and I still think I do), my DH didn't want a green house so we painted it a mid-tone neutral greige with slightly lighter trim. Next to us on one side is a gray house, the other is caramel. Across is beige, neutral yellow, muted sage green, and then another bluish-grey.

So even though my preference is not for neutral, it's a safer choice that probably offends few.

On my street, a couple miles away, a landlord painted his duplex house bright juicy fruit yellow with equally bright turquoise trim. This was about ten years ago. It was photographed and put in the paper.
You would have thought there was something scandalous going on. The uproar! Letters to the editor. b!$*h and moan.
Now this was NOT anywhere special historically, just on the main drag through town. This house was 10 feet to either side from it's neightbors. Boring white clapboard duplexes that were also rentals. And kind of low rent too AAMOF.
Geez painting the lot of them rainbow colors would have at least identified the area as something other than low rent.
Marcolo's green house is a beauty and of course we would like to see it less Kermit but this is America right?
Now ten twelve years later this garish house has just faded to butter the trim looks sort of green; the other houses on the block have never been painted, everything looks dirty.
Just think how cool if all the neighbors would have picked a different color to paint their houses. Someone could have taken a picture of nondescript turned fanciful...might have been posted to Pin something or other.

missymoo12 -- I agree, there are several rental homes on our street, right in a row, and they are all depressing: brown with dark brown trim. At least offer the renters "pride of rentership" or something, "pride of landlordship"...but they just look sad to me.

Edit --

I remember being a renter; the home I rented seemed like cheapo low-end whatever inside. I kind of felt like the landlord didn't care that much about the house...and I'm sure it translated to me not caring that much. I didn't damage anything, but I bet I could have been more careful. I'm pretty sure the shower had vinyl flooring attached to the walls as the "surround". Ugh

This post was edited by melle_sacto on Tue, Dec 30, 14 at 19:32

double post!

This post was edited by melle_sacto on Tue, Dec 30, 14 at 19:29

If M. doesn't like the color of your drapes as glimpsed through the window another thing to kvetch about.
first world problem, much?
Casey

We are living with the results of someone else's choice--red plastic siding on a house 10 feet from ours extending 5 feet behind and 5 feet in front of ours (illegal setbacks, to boot, on the lakeside). All you can see on one side of our home, through very expensive windows meant to take advantage of the views, is that red plastic.

It gives off a pinkish hue into our home and sucks away the light. I can only hope the vinyl siding of today keeps it from turning that sickly pink. Yes, anyone can do whatever they want to their property; however, most of us live in communities, and should consider how our choices affect all those who live in that community. I tire of the "I got mine" attitude.

Dup

This post was edited by jmc01 on Wed, Dec 31, 14 at 5:25

"No, I think Marcolo has a point about taste. It's not purely personal, there are societal, cultural and socioeconomic norms of what is considered "good taste" and what is considered "bad taste", and also norms about who recognizes it as such. It goes back to the Potter Stewart comment about pornography:"

And who decides the societal, cultural and socioeconomic norms? This month's issue of some magazine? Using posters on this forum as a guide, the only socially acceptable color is greige. Sorry, that doesn't fly with me.

I like the houses Debra posted. I don't have the nerve to do that, but I wouldn't mind one of them being next door to me. Interesting people must live there, would love to see the inside.

And who decides the societal, cultural and socioeconomic norms?

The society and culture decide them.

In the ultra-microcosm of the GW Home Decorating Forum, there are those who will insist The Only Good Sofa is a Neutral Sofa. It's true.

And clearly the pink brownstone would be much more acceptable within certain neighborhoods, social groups, cultures and socioeconomic levels. I don't think anyone can argue with that.

And if you express yourself outside the norms within that microcosm, it doesn't work in your favor. You don't have to read all that many threads in GW to pick up on that.

Some might consider this garish, but at least it's with reason...it's a Ronald McDonald house.
{{gwi:2141745}}

This house, the Wells-Thorn House, was painted robin's egg blue around 1803.

I don't think there is a right or wrong attitude about this (lots of good points made on both sides.) It's a complicated issue; context of the neighborhood, motive of the owners, and quality of application. And, personal taste varies big time about color!

This is not about paint color, but it is about my own moment of truth, dealing with adjacent property owners doing things I would never have chosen.

Years ago we were working hard on restoring a Texas Hill Country farmhouse. The land next door sold, and a big new house went up. The people were friendly, but it soon became apparent they had interesting taste. They planted a huge number of palm trees. Bronze statues began to appear; full size deer, a life-sized baby elephant, big Buddha statues, antelopes, blue and purple mirror glass gazing balls on stands. They left their purple Christmas lights up and lit until Valentine’s day, and pumped Dean Martin music through numerous outdoor speakers. I was not initially pleased; it was not what I had in mind for the house next door. And yes, People Were Talking.

One evening they knocked on our door and asked if DH could help install a mermaid statue at the center of a large round fountain they'd built, in front of their property, not far from our driveway. We walked over. The life-sized mermaid had a peaceful smile, and one lovely outstretched arm beckoned to the passing (Texas) traffic with a conch shell. They had already filled the fountain. DH sloshed knee deep in water, helping steady the comely but very heavy siren, trying hard to avoid grabbing her ample...cockle shells, as they balanced her on her fish tail.

It was at that moment I had to let it go. Watching four men wrestle the waving mermaid made me realize that life is short, and we’re goofy to think we can control it (unless we live on 100 acre parcels.) It was better to laugh. They were good kind folks, who had worked hard for years, and were having the time of their lives buying and building things that made them happy. It was their property, their money, and we lived in America.

Eventually they added a ring of statues around the mermaid; frogs playing musical instruments. It made me laugh. Good for them.

I really thought it would adversely affect our property value, but our house still sold for a tidy sum. (And nobody ever had trouble finding our house, as everyone knew where the mermaid was.)

I painted it like this, because I like it. It makes me happy! I could care less what my neighbors think.

You seem to post this with pride. In fact, you're going out of your way to post it, because your color is not that bright, the shutters are tiny, and on a farm they have minimal visual impact on anybody else. They're way too quiet to qualify as garish.

But the statement is nothing to be proud of. It's something a teenager might say. Teenagers think only about themselves. They never worry about the consequences. We expect more from adults.

An adult recognizes that if you show no respect for others, expect none to be shown for you. Paint your house whatever color you like cause it's America, yeah! Then, when you're ready to sell, your irritated neighbor can paint his house however he likes. With gang graffiti and racial slurs, perhaps. Or maybe a big fake CDC sign warning that Ebola victims are buried onsite. Pornographic images are another option. I've seen similar things happen.

Or did you think doing whatever you wanted with no concern for others applied only to you?

[Side note: Can we stop pretending the only two alternatives for exterior house colors are neon orange and beige?]

Notice that in most of the above photos of brightly colored houses there is little or no landscaping, them being urban settings with the houses packed together. So the structure itself is the only place that color interest can be created.

Of course, I don't really have any skin in this game as I live in a condo (and just bought another) and have about zero control over the exterior elements of the building I live in. That said, I currently live in an old suburb of Chicago that has a very nice blend of brick Chicago bungalows, painted lady Victorians, graystone and brick 2flats, and a smattering of other stuff (Frank Lloyd Wright, newer houses, big apartment buildings, etc). I do love to walk around and see the sheer variety of houses. It's lovely even if some of the paint colors taken individually might be a bit bright. I would hate to see a world where people are so concerned about what their neighbors that they are afraid to paint their houses anything but gray or beige, when they yearn for a yellow house or a pink one. Yes, it sucks when someone paints a house grudge house lime, but it's also clear that some people consider all but the most neutral colors to be garish (the one neighbor mentioned who thought medium blue with white trim was garish, neighbors to a house I owned previously who thought my moss green garage was too bright).

To what point are we expected to push down what we want and would truly make us happy just to avoid offending our neighbors? My green garage was not bright or garish at all to my eyes. The green was deep and sedate, it just wasn't white or gray like all the other garages on the alley. Yes, we should have respect for our neighbors, but they should have some respect for us and our variety of expression. If it makes someone happy, why should they feel bad about that?

That said, part of me wants to move way out to the country and have a hippy happy rainbow house.

http://katwise.com/house.html

I live just outside a big city, in a neighborhood built in the 1950s for post-war government employees. Lots of small Capes and ranches. Nowadays those houses are either expanded or torn down for new builds. The house that sits right behind us was bought soon after we moved in a decade ago, and since it was a tiny one that sits between a bunch of new builds, we figured it would soon be levelled. Wrong - the new owner was an older lady, who promptly painted the house neon yellow, a precise match to her bright yellow sports car that sat out front. She helpfully planted some screening on her side of the fence between our homes, but the yellow was impossible to hide and was the most prominent feature of the view from our living room picture window.

A few years later the house went on the market again. I went to the open house and was amazed to see that the entire inside was also decked out in neon yellow - including the kitchen cabinets. Real estate here is crazy, and the owner probably figured she didn't have to repaint to sell it, especially since it would probably get snapped up by a builder. Amazingly, it wasn't - a young woman bought it and swapped out the yellow for soothing greige Hardiplank.

The house next door to us was bought by a builder a few months ago and was quickly levelled. I'm sure the new build will be beige or gray or something similarly non-offensive. Of course, it's also set to top 9k square feet, in a neighborhood filled with original houses that are 1200 to 2500 sqft, and even the new builds rarely top 3500. So whatever the color, I'm pretty sure it will still qualify as garish.

I would not consider a neighbor's choice of paint color to be reflective of their respect or lack thereof for me as their neighbor. Our next-door neighbors had their home painted several years ago. They had a lovely lightish mottled orange brick and they used sage and cream on the siding and trim. Lovely combination. This fall, they repainted. Everything, brick and siding, is a pinkish peachy band-aid-ish color. Quite dreadful, but I certainly didn't take it as a disrepectful or rude choice. I just shake my head and move on. I think life is too short to let imagined slights (or real ones, for that matter), raise my blood pressure.

Mudhouse, love your post. I agree completely.

Oh and I would disagree with the characterization of teenagers as well.

Annie my first thought when I saw your pic of the Ronald McDonald House was that the colours looked welcoming.

Mudhouse, I loved your story (and the way you told it). "DH sloshed knee deep in water, helping steady the comely but very heavy siren, trying hard to avoid grabbing her ample...cockle shells, as they balanced her on her fish tail." LOL

{{gwi:2141746}}

Another contribution from McDonald's. It's a franchise office in the UK, in an historic district where the residents have been working to keep everything original. Imagine that being your daily living room view. I'm sure some people would love it, or at least pretend to on the Internet. LOL.

I guess it's personal preference, I too prefer more variety, which is why I likely won't choose to live in a place with restrictive covenants.

My neighbourhood is composed primarily of modest white and beige homes. But I certainly enjoy the occasional dark purple (two) and bright orange (two or three) interlopers. Certainly lime green and bright orange front doors abound. I imagine when this place built up in the 1960s that bright colors were more common. One of my favorite houses predates the neighbourhood proper and is bright turquoise with cadet blue trim. It has a carriage house in the back that I'd give eye teeth for.

I'll never forget my first experience with the real 90s style of suburbia. I visited Oakville, ON with a friend. Every single house was beige. One house painted their front door lavender. It was the only landmark in the subdivision. Of course they were made to paint the door back to beige. Visiting from downtown Montreal (brick flats painted all colors of the rainbow) it was a puzzle to me why people would want to live that way and I can't say I truly understand it to this day, but I'm glad there are communities for people who like that sort of thing.

There is a house in my old village that for as long as I can remember was painted bright pink with horribly clashing dull maroon trim. The age of the whole scheme lent it a sort of landmark status and I was pretty sad when new owners painted it a more tasteful grey and white.

The green along the spine garish here?

Here is a link that might be useful: Shark

The shark was a protest against Hiroshima. A bit late. But I'm sure the owner would applaud his neighbors erecting large pro-bomb displays. Or perhaps a giant anti-Japanese WWII-era poster with a huge racist caricature on it. Or is he the only special one?

I'm still waiting for somebody to link to that paint chip fan deck that has only neons and beige.

I'm really surprised at some of the statements in this discussion that cross the lines into personal attacks, just for having a different opinion. I wish I had photos of the neighborhood I grew up in. Picture a 1960's neighborhood with a mix of home styles and colors, with the homes way too close together as the area was platted with thin lots. Usually just room for just as single driveway to separate the houses. There were some homes in sedate colors but others were in bright colors that some here would definitely consider garish. Others were neutral but had very bright trim colors. I remember quite a few of the more neutral homes had bright-colored doors. Maybe I just didn't hear or remember any adults complaining about any colors others used on their homes but I really don't remember it being an issue if someone did something bright.

But I suppose those were different times. Each block had about 18 houses on it, so about 35-36 houses facing each other. And there were over 30 kids in those houses in close enough age range to me to play with. I'm not counting the homes with older kids, too old to play with, or babies. Too many to count if I try to include them. And that was just on our adjacent blocks. That doesn't count the kids in the next blocks or around the corners. It was sure a fun place to grow up. You could always find someone to play with. Yeah, I'm a Boomer.

Maybe it was more important for people to just get along because we lived like a true neighborhood with people visiting on front porches, kids playing together in the street. And, of course, fewer moms worked so there were lots of coffee klatsches and other neighborhood visits going on. Heck, I even remember neighbors being willing to move cars off the street in order for us to play a game of softball on the street (the bases were spray-painted on the concrete).

Of course, interior design back then was more colorful than it is today as well. If you google kitchen designs of the 30's-60's, interiors were explosions of prints and colors that would be considered garish by many people today.

Anyway, just wondering if neighborhoods where people are friends and interact regularly, and not just co-habiting in a general location as is more typical today, made attitudes different and people more tolerant of colors people painted their houses with. I think people tend to be more tolerant of weird things friends do than when strangers do it.

Annie my first thought when I saw your pic of the Ronald McDonald House was that the colours looked welcoming

Funny, just reading a Longmire book that mentioned "scours yellow" and realized that's the color of the McDonald house...

Pam's house is a lovely example of how it would be just fine to have a purple house next door. I would love to have that on my street.

I'm not sure about the barn though! :)

The Chernobyl nuclear disaster occurred in April of 1986. The shark was installed just after that in response to all nuclear proliferation/power/bombs, not just Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Marcolo, I hope your new year is full of good things with little to complain about! :)

I love the combinations of colors on my bright house! We live on the beach in FL and houses around us are painted brown, green, and, of course, white. If this offends, oh well.

I hope everyone's New Year is filled with less posing. LOL

mudhouse, your neighbors playing loud Dean Martin music reminds me of that Sopranos episode with the boat.

If I wanted others to tell me what color to paint my house I'd live in a development with a HOA . That would be torture to me, so I live in an old house and do what I want.

Why do some people think we have to all be the same?

If you google Nantucket homes exterior there will be dozens and dozens of relatively sedate (often quite sophisticated) homes, none of which are generally considered "boring". As with the plane of a true black and white photograph, when well executed, an entire image/property functions as a unit and the fine nuances of structure, balance, composition, etc (and with a property, the landscaping), support the whole. Texture and contrast etc. assume elevated importance while color from plantings/flowers create unique settings even when nearby architectural elements are similar. It takes a lot of thought, patience and likely money to develop a cohesive plan where the elements of a property work together harmoniously; hardscaping, landscaping, topography, architectural features, outbuildings, roofing texture and color etc. let alone siding type and color.
Or one can just say "well, I love electric pink", and slap that on.
The strange direction this thread has taken, noted by marcolo's comment: [Side note: Can we stop pretending the only two alternatives for exterior house colors are neon orange and beige?] Exactly. The ends of the continuum are constantly being pitted here; all beige or concentrated color for color's sake. I thankfully have never been to an area of all beige homes, but the antidote is not clown city or a crayon box explosion - *unless* that look is supported by the locale. Obviously the OP did not have communities or areas of saturated colorful homes in mind by the nature of the query about "garish" which I take to mean a home that colorwise STANDS OUT from the rest, i.e., well outside the norm for the area. And as communities across the country go, an all beige area would be on the far end of the continuum, (but establishing its' own norm within its own microcosm). Neighborhoods I've witnessed over the years are generally a variety of colors with probably white slightly more common but with shutters of differing and at times bright colors, but then also brick homes, wood or shakes, grey, blue, green, pale to mid strength yellow sometimes with all white accents, some have black, and occasionally green....there will always be at least one New England barn red around, some dark browns, a taupe here or there; these homes all pretty much play well together, and most have somewhat greyed tones...then some years back people started expressing themselves with bright saturated-color front doors....which seems now to have evolved or devolved according to your perspective, to utilizing ones entire home as a canvas to create a personal statement, because one can. Like cranking up the modified speakers in the car and driving with the windows rattling, even at midnight down your street, because one can.

Mudhouse, I loved your story! Life truly IS short, but for me, and maybe its because I may be much more sensitive to colors than many, but that's all the more reason why I hope never to have to deal with/spew over an "it's all about me" neighbor's florescent paint choice.

I don't think our experience with our next door sculptural menagerie is a super good comparison with paint color, so I'm glad you folks didn't mind me posting it. It wasn't that bad gardening to "Volare...oh oh...!" I really wouldn't trade my memories of those neighbors for anything.

For me, the motivation behind bright house colors does make a difference. Marcolo's example of the lime green Cape Cod house is upsetting to me because those colors were chosen in spiteful anger. That owner is purposefully trashing the fine house, and I'd think of that anger every time I saw it.

I find it easier to accept house colors I don't like if I think the owners chose the colors because they like them. That way, I'm focusing on the positive thought of how it makes them happy (looking for the silver lining, I guess.)

That said, and although my previous neighbors did teach me to loosen up, I also find it hard to ignore the visualization of deeinohio's post above, with red plastic siding ten feet away, casting a pinkish light inside my house. That would really test my love of individual freedom, I suspect.

Marcolo posted:

“I painted it like this, because I like it. It makes me happy! I could care less what my neighbors think.

You seem to post this with pride. In fact, you're going out of your way to post it, because your color is not that bright, the shutters are tiny, and on a farm they have minimal visual impact on anybody else. They're way too quiet to qualify as garish.

But the statement is nothing to be proud of. It's something a teenager might say. Teenagers think only about themselves. They never worry about the consequences. We expect more from adults.”
____________________________________________

Your post is WAY out of line. What is the point of homeownership if it is not to do what makes you happy? We are talking about the color of house paint.

And "We expect more from adults." Really. Get over yourself.

May I put a "Like" on Finally Home's post above?

"Anyway, just wondering if neighborhoods where people are friends and interact regularly, and not just co-habiting in a general location as is more typical today, made attitudes different and people more tolerant of colors people painted their houses with. I think people tend to be more tolerant of weird things friends do than when strangers do it."

Funkycamper, This is a very good point. I remember the neighborhoods growing up were very different than today's neighborhoods (in my limited experience). I can still list off the houses on the street I grew up on by the people's names.

That said, and although my previous neighbors did teach me to loosen up, I also find it hard to ignore the visualization of deeinohio's post above, with red plastic siding ten feet away, casting a pinkish light inside my house.. That would really test my love of individual freedom, I suspect

I do not think that you meant this as it is written, individual freedom is much more than just picking what color siding is on your house and is not something to be taken for granted.

finallyhome, your rant vividly illustrates what I am talking about. Total concern with self and disregard for others is a characteristic we accept only in children, because they are not fully developed. We do not accept it in adults.

What is the point of home ownership if it is not to do what makes you happy?

I mean, seriously, what reaction do you expect to get from saying, "I don't care about you. I only care about me?" Praise? Applause? No. What you get back is: Then why the heck should anybody care about you?

One of the reasons people buy houses is to live in some sort of community--whether it's a NYC apartment with lively street life, a rural town where you know everybody, or a suburb where the neighbrs watch your kids and keep a spare set of your keys. Anyone who thinks they will be able to take the benefits of a community without giving anything back has a lot of growing up to do.

Peewee, your example of Nantucket homes is a good one, but there are thousands more. The red roofs of Florence. The French quarter in New Orleans. Paris. The architecture displays enormous variety, but it's still bound together by something cohesive. Suddenly inserting a neon pink building destroys the neighborhood, not just the house. Famous art historian Vincent Scully used to criticize Modernism this way. He would show a new glass box skyscraper being built in the sixties and earning much praise for the way it "stood out" as special. Then he'd show the neighborhood decades later. Now everything was a glass box, the neighborhood had lost all charm and it was the few remaining old buildings that stood out.

To your comment about the strange turn of the thread: I'm still waiting for that fan deck with only neon orange and beige. It doesn't exist. You can of course have an extremely colorful house without being garish. But then again, people have said all sorts of silly things to support their " pro-garish" arguments in this thread. I don't for a second believe that they actually believe what they're saying. Everybody knows what a garish house is. Nobody wants one next door. This isn't remotely controversial. They're just playing games.

I think it is the "I could care less what my neighbors think!"

is the part of the statement that's problematic, because that's not something that can just be applied to the color of a shutter, it's an attitude that could be applied to many things.

Perhaps the way it was written was unintended, this is the internet, and I know I type things that come out not in the way intended.

But I have lived right next to people who "could care less what the neighbors think!" and it's rarely pleasant. I know this thread is about paint colors, but even here, there is a type of person who picks a color or combination because they really think it is nice -but it's not--whether they have bad taste or are from a culture that has different references that work don't translate well here, whatever.

But there are clearly people who paint their houses weird colors --or do other things--because they don't care what other people think and they want everyone to Know that they don't care what other people think.

I will give a different point of reference that I use, and that is certain types of haircuts or manners of dress particularly when one isn't under 25 anymore. If I meet someone who is closer to middle age or in middle age who has a ridiculous haircut or color or dresses in some inappropriate manner, more often than not, that person is an a-----e. They may be a tolerable a-----e, but generally their attitude about most things is "Me first, look at me, I'm number one, you second, I don't care, I'm a free spirit" etc. ad nauseum. Fine. and then this free spirit turns out to be a patient or client or individual who is extremely high maintenance, demanding and not "free" at all.

The other thing that is lost in the shuffle of this thread is what "neighbors" mean. If you live on a couple acres off a road where people are speeding by, I don't even consider that you have neighbors, really. And I know people who live in developments where the neighbor is an anonymous wave as they slot the car into the garage, and the out door part of the neighborhood is absolutely deserted. No one is ever seen not encapsulated in their own cars. The people you DO see outside are the people who cut the grass or clean for the people who are never outside.

But my neighbors are about ten inches away on each side, the thickness of a concrete block with some plaster on each side. Be sure that I DO care what they think because I want them to care what I think.

"I don't for a second believe that they actually believe what they're saying. Everybody knows what a garish house is. Nobody wants one next door. This isn't remotely controversial. They're just playing games."
"If I meet someone who is closer to middle age or in middle age who has a ridiculous haircut or color or dresses in some inappropriate manner, more often than not, that person is an a-----e."

No matter how many times these statement are repeated, they remain opinions, not facts. Saying something over and over again (here and in other threads where the same statements re: middle aged appropriateness have been made) does not make an opinion a fact. Sorry. I think that is why many here add IMHO or "I think..." to their posts.

" If I meet------more often than not", speaks to it Not being an absolute, it Not being a Fact, and being a matter of personal experience, which is an Opinion.

I am also not talking about someone who dresses a little young or has an edgy haircut.

Have you ever met a guy who's 40, has dreadlocks that probably have bugs in them, is not Scottish, has never been to Scotland but wears a kilt? Have you ever met a woman who dresses like Cindy Lauper did in 1982 but is past fifty? (Even Cindy doesn't). Have you ever met anyone who wears pseudo cultural-ethnic dress but has never been to the country it references, and which would not be worn regularly by actual people from that country? What are they like?

In my opinion and in my experience, while individuals like this may be nice on some level, In My Experience (opinion) they are often trying to make a Statement or Two, the very least of which is "I do not care what Others Think".There may or may not be a Motive behind it, but at the very least In My Experience (opinion) it is some sort of Attention-Getting Mechanism, which is a motive of it's own.

This post was edited by palimpsest on Thu, Jan 1, 15 at 12:18

Be sure that I DO care what they think because I want them to care what I think.

I am all in favor of colorful houses, but I think the above says it all for me. I personally would not paint my house neon pink if I thought that everyone around me would go "eeeeww" everytime they drove by (or worse yet, think to themselves "what is wrong with those people?") I would however paint it a "tasteful" pink - something between beige and neon orange.

Many years ago, when we bought our first home, we moved in, and it turned out that our next door neighbor, who had obviously been asked by the seller to refrain from doing so while they were in selling mode, was conducting a permanent garage sale in the driveway (these houses were abutting, nearly touching), and that he drove a van painted like a pair of Puccini bell bottoms I had in the 60s. We were not pleased, because it wasn't the sort of neighborhood we had chosen to live in, even though it was urban and funky to boot. He was a nice guy, and we never said anything negative, but we were happy when he sold to an art restorer!

"What is the point of homeownership if it is not to do what makes you happy?" Well, I live in a neighborhood where a couple of neighbors did/do just that. One older couple a few doors down never did a. single. thing. to upkeep their home; It was recently taken by the city for years of non-tax payment, and it sits in all its' dilapidated glory all boarded up and falling apart. I expect they are still traveling around the world on their annual cruises. The young couple who moved in several years ago two doors down on the other side apparently do only what makes them happy, and that is NOT yard work or picking anything up/putting anything where it belongs. There is a jumbled mess of crap strewn ALL over their yard. One of the reasons I've bought a house elsewhere. But I don't for a moment think that the decrepit unkempt properties aren't going to make my home harder to sell, and/or dramatically affect the price I can get. So, no, I disagree with the juvenile, selfish all-about-me attitude whether it's about shock-value house color, creating a noise nuisance, eyesore of disrepair, etc.

When we purchased our home, my wise DH told me to take a very good look at everything inside the property line and be certain I really liked it, because we would have no control over the view beyond. It could change tomorrow. Excellent advice 24 years ago and I still would not choose to live anywhere else.
This post reminds me of a story I once heard from a coworker who went to visit a relative in another state. Not far from the relative's home was a modest one story house painted a vivid shamrock green in an area of neutral colored houses. When my friend commented, she was informed that the people who lived there had a young son with a terminal disease. That green was his favorite color.
If the OP is truly asking a question, the answer is simple. Knock on their door and ask them. The answer may surprise you. My thought is simply live and let live. Real neighborhoods are about the people living there and not paint anyway.

Usually the painting is done by the people living there.

The comments about clothing remind me of an attitude that's common among young people who still dress punk. First, I can never figure out why somebody would rebel by dressing exactly the same way their parents did in the '80s. I mean, the original punks didn't rebel by wearing poodle skirts. Anyway, it's common to hear someone with six earrings, two nose rings and a pink Mohawk complain that other people look at them differently. Really? You don't say? They invested a lot of time, money and effort to have a specific effect on their audience--and then complain when they do.

"I do not think that you meant this as it is written, individual freedom is much more than just picking what color siding is on your house and is not something to be taken for granted."

Choosing a house color is not the summation of individual freedom. It is one of the countless ways we are blessed to enjoy individual freedom, large and small, in every day life. (I'm actually a fiercely patriotic sort, who watches like a bulldog for small intrusions into the freedom I treasure.)

If my neighbor did something to their property that truly degraded the quality of my every day life, my inner conversation would go something like this:

Self A: I can't believe they did that. What are they thinking? Don't they know it affects my life, and my property value?
Self B: Regardless, there's no HOA, law, or city ordinance that says they can't do it. Their right to choose what they want protects your right to choose what you want.
Self A: But, this is unfair. There has to be a way to protect my property value from being lowered by somebody else's choices.
Self B: There is. You can move to a neighborhood with rules that restrict choices.
Self A: What? Uproot my entire family, just because the guy next door has poor taste?
Self B: Just be glad you have the freedom to move your family anywhere you’d like.

In the end, I'd either let it go, and accept the red plastic siding and pink light (as I accepted the mermaid statue and her frog band) or I'd move. Either way it would be a test for my love of the system that allows people to make their own choices. Personally, my belief in the system would be confirmed. It's easy to say you love something, but sometimes going to the mat for it can make that love stronger.

Maybe you meant that the term "individual freedom" shouldn't be applied to something as trivial as house color, but I view freedom as a fine thread that winds through our lives in many little ways we don’t even notice any more...until it's gone.

I was going to say the red font you used was unnecessary, but then I thought it was pretty intuitive of you, in a thread about how people respond to bold colors. :-)

I really don't see what house colors have to do with patriotism. Does the rest of the world run its paint choices by the politburo? If anything, Americans are far more tolerant of, say, government eavesdropping than European countries.

There are masses and masses of restrictions homeowners face. That doesn't mean they're being oh-pressed.

On top of which, just because something is legal doesn't mean it's justifiable. People do all sorts of bad things they can't be arrested for. Like wearing yoga pants in public. They can still be criticized for it.

Some of the bright colors are culturally influenced. I lived in southern Mississippi for many years and a lot of colored folks choose to paint their homes, and even graves (many are the above ground cement types due to the higher water table) in very bright colors. Many feel that bright colors keep bad juju away, so you might consider what ethnicity the people are who have the bright colored homes and appreciate their individualness.