Black and White with Wood

Kurt is worried that pairing wood floors and furniture with black painted doors and window sashes not to mention black chandeliers and other accents will look silly.  Personally, I really like the look when mixed with pops of soft colour and chalky white walls and millwork.  Black and white just looks too stylized for my taste - I'm a bit too rumpled and messy to really pull it off. And going with just wood everywhere is, well, boring.

Behold:

(Coco+Kelly via Plush Palette)

(Lili Diallo via Plush Palate)

(House Beautiful via Plush Palate)

((Marie Claire Maison via Plush Palette)

(The English Muse via Plush Palette)

(Velvet and Linen via Plush Palette)

(Design Sponge via Create Girl via Plush Palate)

(Ferm Living via Plush Palette)

(Darryl Carter via Elle Decor via Plush Palate)

(Domino via Pretty Lovely)


(Domino via Pretty Lovely)

I want to sit in one of these chairs and look out the window. While drinking tea, I think, and listening to music by one of the various Sarah's on my ipod.

Update:  Kurt liked it very much!  All I need to do is show photos and "no's" become "yes'" magically!

I wonder what's under the carpet on the stairs and other ideas

I wonder what's under the carpet on the stairs leading to the half storey...  I wouldn't do this to my main set of stairs but I think painting out the steps and wallpapering the risers might be a neat idea leading up to the (future) lounge and guest room.  Well, at least until we can replace the stairwell of death with something safer...

Also, I must remind myself when we start painting that the interior of our closets will be a colour other than white.  Kurt may not like this.  Seriously, it'll look good.  I promise!

Also, we will be painting our window sashes black.  Kurt may also not like this.  But, since we're planning on replacing our windows anyways, I likely will be able to convince him.  A paint choice could be Benjamin Moore Toucan Black (apparently, it has a good, navy-purple-y undertone.

(Design*Sponge via Door Sixteen)

(Door Sixteen)

Speaking of things being painted out black, what about doors?  This entire collection of gorgeous black and white interiors features any number of doors painted out a lovely black...

And below, here are some photos of what we have in store for our stairs.  These photos are via Door Sixteen.

(Sugar City Journal and Ferm Living via Door Sixteen)

And after all that...

As I noted earlier, this weekend was spend splashing different white paints all over my second storey to see how the paints worked in our light.  Well, after much consideration, none of them worked.  I then took my swatch of tile, hardwood and selection of fabrics and whatnots and placed them up against the stairwell wainscoting, which is two thirds untinted white paint mixed with a 1/3 of my fave warm gray (BM OC-14), and it's perfect.  It was literally staring me in the face the entire time.

I've already warned my husband we'll likely be painting the first storey white as well after we finish the second storey...

More etsy finds...  I love these. They're from Drawings and Paintings by Yellena.  I am very excited to see what these will look like in person!

( Drawings and Paintings by Yellena)

( Drawings and Paintings by Yellena)

Paint Samples Galore

I've been busy trying to get a few additional things done.  I've got eight different white paints to test so today I'll be painting splotches over our walls so I can see how each looks in different lights.  Faves so far are Benjamin Moore's OC-17 White Dove and Ralph Lauren's Cove Point, which is an exact match to Restoration Hardware's Sanddollar (if you ever want an RH paint, RL is the manufacturer).

Meanwhile, our hardwood has been loaded on a truck and is on it's way.  Our washstands, however, are now on back order until the end of January.  I'm okay with this as it'll give us a chance to get back from Mexico and install wainscotting in the evenings (we're doing the finicky trim installation to cut costs - it's easy but labour intensive).   I was not looking forward to installing it behind already-installed sinks.

I also stumbled across a fantastic idea in a back issue of House and Home magazine.  This fall, when we were going through my grandmother's house, we found a massive collection of doilies.  Some were one's she'd made, some were made by my Auntie Donna and others were from my great grandmother and great, great grandmother.  They're beautiful but I was at a loss about what to do with them.  I'm going to frame them in black frames on black matting and then display them as a collection.  I don't have the picture from H&H digitally but here's another I found that does the same thing.  I don't quite like the presentation as much, though.

(The Newlywed Diaries)

Paint Colours to Test

I've been doing some research on the best whites.  This weekend, I'm heading to Benjamin Moore with this list of paints so I can get tester pots.  Then, I'll be painting swatches of my walls to see what whites work best in our light.  Here is the list of the best of Benjamin Moore white paints by Apartment Therapy:

Benjamin Moore Super White
Benjamin Moore Linen White
Benjamin Moore China White
Benjamin Moore Ballet White
Benjamin Moore Cloud Nine
Benjamin Moore Decorators White
Benjamin Moore White Dove
I'll also need to track down my April 2009 issue of House and Home as there is a great article on Lynda Reeves favourite whites!  In the meantime, here are a few other House and Home white paint pics.

Benjamin Moore
Floral White (OC-29)
White Dove (OC-17)
Cloud White (CC-40)
Oxford White (CC-30)

Ralph Lauren
Picket Fence White (WW57)
Poncho White (WW58)
Mother of Pearl (WW21)
Studio Cream (UL01)
Sail White (WW49)