Your living room is one of the most versatile interior spaces of your home. It can be a relaxing oasis at the end of a long day or serve as the central gathering point when you have guests over. That’s why it’s so crucial to ensure the interior design of this room perfectly reflects your unique personality, style, and needs.
When creating your ideal living room, one of the first steps is choosing what color to paint its walls. This will set the tone for all of your other design choices and help craft the perfect look and feel for the room. Here at The Reflective Designer, we’ve done numerous color consultations for homes, and that’s helped us glean invaluable insights into what colors are best suited for the living room. In our experience, these are some of the best and worst colors you can choose.
Living room paint colors to avoid.
Dark brown.
While dark brown may seem like a fairly neutral color to choose for your living room, we often find in our home color consultations that it’s one that doesn’t suit most living rooms. Not only is it somewhat bland and dull, but the darker hue causes the space to feel smaller than it actually is.
Yellow.
Some homeowners choose to paint their living rooms yellow because they think it’ll give the space a warm and inviting atmosphere. In all actuality, though, yellow can do the exact opposite of this. Studies have shown that it’s one of the colors that’s prone to causing feelings of anxiety and self-doubt, which likely isn’t what you want from your living room.
Neon.
Homeowners who really want to make a loud statement with their living room color might consider going with bold neon colors, but our team of interior design experts recommends avoiding this trend. The neon paint creates an abrasive feeling within the room and can become an overbearing distraction from the rest of your design options.
Ideal colors to use in the living room.
Black.
Many people are surprised to learn that our home color consultations recommend using such a bold color for their living room, but black is a fantastic option for anyone who favors the unexpected and dramatic for their interior spaces. It’s perfect for tempering the glare of natural sunlight that enters the room, and any furniture and decorations will pop against the dark backdrop.
Olive green.
Green colors tend to evoke feelings of calmness and serenity, which is what makes it such a suitable choice for your living room. It’s perfectly suited for mid-century aesthetics, and it makes for a great accent to lighter decorations and pieces of furniture. Olive green, in particular, is fantastic because it’s not as overwhelming as bolder or brighter shades of green.
Off-white.
Off-white paints like cream, eggshell, and ivory have long been a staple for living rooms, and for good reason. It’s a very palatable choice in paint and can even make your interior spaces feel larger than they are. Plus, when you use off-white, every non-white piece of furniture or décor will stand out exceptionally well.
Are you struggling to find the perfect color for your living room?
Then schedule a color consultation for your home with the experts here at The Reflective Designer. For more than four decades, we’ve been helping homeowners in Boston and Phoenix create stunning interior spaces. We understand that there is no single color that’s perfect for everyone.
That’s why we’ll work with you to understand your unique goals and preferences so that we can make the optimal recommendation for your needs. You can learn more about some of the services we offer, or connect with us online to schedule your initial consultation.
