Okay so we didn’t try 50. But it feels that way sometimes!
The floor was about to go in the kitchen at the time. I’m sure you’re sick of hearing about it, and I’m certainly sick of talking about it. Can I just walk on it already?
However, there is something I wanted to do before it goes in: paint the walls.
I’ve painted our feature wall blue, which you can see here and I still love the colour. Love isn’t even enough of a strong word.
The rest of the walls however, were painted with your standard Brilliant White emulsion, as I think is pretty normal for newly plastered walls. Anything but that terracotta brown/pink hybrid colour. *shudder*
However, as I’ve mentioned on here before, I really hate white walls. Not necessarily the colour itself. The principle of it in my house. Just because I know what will happen. Fingerprints will happen. Spaghetti Bolognaise will happen. Drunken parties will happen. A white wall in the kitchen just doesn’t add up to me. It’s like white cars. Joe think they look snazzy. I think they look unfinished.
One thing I do like though is how bright, airy and fresh the room is when white, and I don’t want to lose that open feel.
We came across the same dilemma in our bedroom all those months ago (woah it’s actually 2 years) and opted for a lovely grey as an alternative. We used Dulux’s Polished Pebble and it’s gorgeous. It’s most definitely grey (unlike some others who often carry a tinge of blue or beige) and it’s warm too.
I think sometimes grey can sound a bit dreary as a colour, particularly when it comes to decorating, but to me it’s the perfect neutral, and it’s classic in my eyes, as opposed to dull.
I had hoped that the Polished Pebble would transfer into the kitchen but sadly, it looks significantly darker in there than the bedroom.
So, we went on a hunt for an alternative. I think in all we tried about 15 samples on the kitchen wall and if I learned anything it’s that the word ‘grey’ means jibberish when it comes to paint colours. More often, the paints were yellow, baby blue, brown, or just too dark a grey for what I wanted.
I was so tempted to mix the Polished Pebble with a white emulsion and hope for the best, but quite frankly, we were in a hurry. After some hardcore Googling, I came across 1829 Craig & Rose in Pantry White.
After a really generous offer from my mum to paint our kitchen walls whilst I was at work, within 2 days we’d picked out the colour, sampled it, and got the whole room fully decorated.
Subtle is how I’d describe the colour. In fact, that may be an understatement, and it’s really only when you compare it to the white ceiling , or the unpainted area behind one of our kitchen shelves, that you can tell it’s grey at all. But I like that. It’s certainly a white with a hue of grey, as opposed to a bold grey with hints of other colours.
My mum did such a wonderful job (thanks mum!!) and I think it’s a gorgeous warm paint that takes away the shock that before lived in the ‘Brilliant’ white we basecoated with. Now, finally, the floor can be put in: the final stage of the kitchen.
