Color for a narrow dining room

[adb0329]

Hello there! I'm new at this so please bare with me. I am an avid SL reader and am trying to renovate my 138 year old home! So far my color choices have been pretty easy since I am trying to stay in the colonial color spectrum (muted colors in general) but I am having a problem choosing the color for my dining room. It is 9x20 and you have to pass through it to get to the kitchen (muted yellow), the bathroom (muted green), and living room (warm beige). Luckily I have 10 foot ceilings so the room doesn't look too small, but I want to choose a color that has some warmth to it but won't make it look smaller. I was thinking to pizzaz up the walls to do a stripe effect in the same color, just with matte and high-gloss paint but am not sure that would look right in a room with a weird shape. Any thoughts and suggestions would be greatly appreciated!

[R~Mary]

Your home sounds lovely! Does your dining room have a lot of windows in it? Considering the amount of light you get in the room might influence the color that you choose for it. I was thinking maybe a soft green with a darker green stripe? If you go that way, the green will blend with the yellow of the kitchen and the beige of the living room.

[lulumaryjo]

I love the technique of the gloss/matte stripes and would love to use it in a room someday, but, IMO the stripes would accent the long/narrow characteristic of this room. Do you have any solid walls in this room, or are they all broken up by a doorway or windows? And do you have any tall furniture in this room, or is it all table height.

[Mari']

Are you able to post a picture of the room as it is...may make it easier to help. I thnk making one wall rather bright would really pick up the room...perhaps a deep red.

[adb0329]

Thanks for the advice! In response to lulumaryjo ... no there really isn't one wall that doesn't have a door or window on it. I actually do have a rather tall china cabinet along one wall (7 feet tall or so) and have a large vase on top of that with flowers. The two windows almost touch in the one corner and basically go from floor to ceiling, the treatments I have on them are really the only punch of color for the walls. While I am trying to stay somewhat traditional with my color choices, I want to do something that dresses the walls up. I was afraid putting chair railing and/or wainscoting on them would break up the wall and only bring to your attention how to narrow the room is.

I would love to paint the room a rich red, but would be afraid that would make the room look narrower. I do want something warm and inviting, but not make the space look cramped.

[lulumaryjo]

I usually like to work with something for inspiration when I do one of my rooms. It might be a piece of artwork or a fabric. If I'm starting from scratch I think about the "feel" of the room. For a dining room I think of how I would like it to dress up for Sunday dinners and holidays, but still be casual enough for us every day. If you aren't using an inspiration other than "colonial" then the red or a darker green would seem to be good choices. If you choose the green, you could go even darker on one wall in the room, maybe the one opposite the most windows, or broken up by the most furniture.

I did this in browns in one of my dining rooms. Most of the time you can't tell it is a different color, but it is very subtle (I think I just went down one or two samples of the same color strip) and I chose the wall that I didn't want to wash out to a lighter color in the brightest part of the day. At night, it is a richer color, but not in a jarring way. I don't think this would work with red though.

Let me know your thoughts on this. I really love discussing decorating and we haven't had much on this bulletin board lately.

[adb0329]

Eureka! I took your advice and looked for inspiration ... and I found it in the centerpiece I have on the table (the picture that is attached). In the second picture we are considering the second color down on the color swatch. I'm still not sold on doing a solid wall color so I'm still considering doing the stripe thing or maybe a double of roll color to break up the wide expanse of the 20 foot long wall. Thanks so much for your help, and please let me know if you have any more ideas!

[Sandra C]

Painting one of the shorter walls a darker shade will bring it nearer the eye, so you might want to experiment with that. Good luck!