Really need help with wall paint for white kitchen

11 years ago

Hello,

Thanks for reading this, we have been going crazy with this decision. We have a whole new kitchen and great room. As you can see, we have a white kitchen; the cabinets are lacquer matched with BM White Dove and Fantastic White granite. We would like to have a good contrast between the white cabinets and the wall. However, we need to balance that need with painting the high-ceiling great room with the same color. If we pick a color with higher contrast, such as BM Gray Owl, we are worried that the great room/loft will look too drab. I should also mention there is a loft overlooking the high ceilings and great room. Initially, we had asked both the kitchen, great room, upstairs loft to all be painted with BM Soft Chamois which is what the pictures show. It looks fine in the great room/loft/high-ceiling area, but there just isn't enough constrast in the kitchen.

So in the first picture, you can see facing out from kitchen. To the left of the sliding glass door, you can see where the wall comes out a bit forming an edge (transition from 2x6 to 2x4 wall), where the high ceilings begin. We are thinking we will paint the entire kitchen upto this point as BM Gray Owl. In the second picture, is a view from the great room towards the kitchen where you can almost see the same edge and also part of the loft and upstairs wall, which we are thinking about doing all in BM Soft Chamois.

So the question is, will this look weird? Our GC thinks it'll look fine, since the edge will mark the transitions from the two colors. The other wall of the kitchen (not shown) basically just ends at a desk right after the pantry, so we would stop the Gray Owl there. BTW, you can see where we've tried out a bunch of colors, including Gray Owl to the left of the sliding glass door and close to the ceiling above hood vent cap.

Thanks so much! I apologize for being long winded and having poor lighting in the pics!

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Comments (6)

socalss
Original Author
11 years ago
Here's the 2nd pic.
a2gemini
11 years ago
Looking great!!! We had a similar problem with a cathedral ceiling in the breakfast room and a vaulted ceiling in the great room but an 8 foot ceiling in the kitchen and the DR part of the great room.
Our cabinets are not white but we used BM Coastal path - might be too brown for your taste - but the richness seemed about right to have enough contrast without being too dark. (We are a warm kitchen)
We have only done the kitchen and breakfast room so far. The other color that I considered was Weimaraner also from BM. Those with WM claim it is almost a chameleon color as it takes on the character of the room.
In any case, I am not the color expert, but I don't think it is too dark for a large area.

Here is a fun website with a lot of gray swatches painted.
http://www.glitterandgoatcheese.com/tag/benjamin-moore-gray/

http://colorchats.benjaminmoore.com/2012/06/fifty-shades-of-gray-paint/gray-owl-2137-60-from-house-beautiful/
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eam44
11 years ago
I was thinking this same solution to your problem as I was reading the question (i.e. why do they have to be the same color - isn't there a point at which they can switch?). Both paints are lovely,and using both, each in its own spot with a natural endpoint,will be beautiful.
petra66_gw
11 years ago
Are you going to put in a backsplash? If so, maybe wait with the paint decision until the backsplash is in. This might influence your decision. BTW, I like the colour you have now, enough contrast for me. HTH, Petra
carybk
11 years ago
A few sentences into reading, I almost looked to see if I had written this question! We have the same situation-- white kitchen, wanting contrast in the kitchen, but wanting something light in the room into which the kitchen opens up. I think your two color solution will work fine and you have a natural place to break the color. (That's what we plan too.)
socalss
Original Author
11 years ago
Thanks for the replies everyone! It sounds like this is not that uncommon, I just got worried that I couldn't find any pictures on here or Houzz that had the paint colors changing over an edge of a great room.

I'm especially concerned about how it'll look from the great room looking into the kitchen since the edge is more 'diffused' from that view point. So, I'm worried that it will look like we just stopped the Soft Chamois and went to Gray Owl.

a2gemini, thanks for the gray links, we'll take a closer look at it and also Weimaraner.

Petra, yeah, we are going to put in a backsplash, but I don't think it'll change our paint dilemma since we'll want to do the contrast that we're looking for.
I really appreciate the responses!