HOME IMPROVEMENTS
Paint Colors to
Brighten Every Room
GET THE LOOK
For wall-to-wall color:
Monterey White by Benjamin Moore Paints
(HC-27); benjaminmoore.com
Along the handrail and knoll post color:
Midsummer’s Night by Benjamin Moore
Paints (2134-20); benjaminmoore.com
Transformed trim color:
Creamy White by PPG Paints (512-2);
ppgpittsburghpaints.com
J
BEFORE
amie and Jim Graham had been living in their Wexford residence
for two decades before they realized that it’s actually their
dream home. The couple bought the brick-and-cedar Colonial
in the Ramblewood neighborhood back in 1993. When the builders
contracted it in 1986, the house served as a showpiece. “The interior is
covered in wood—on the foyer’s vaulted ceiling, on much of the walls,
and there’s crown molding everywhere,” Jamie explains.
Yet the elegant detailing and natural beauty of the wood were
obscured by a high-gloss, green-blue stain. “Back in the ‘80s, I’m
sure that was impressive, but it really dated the entire look of the
home,” Jamie comments. In 2012, the Grahams had painters come in
to assess the situation. “One of them said, ‘Lady, it would be cheaper
for you to move.’ So we put it to rest for a while.” Then the Grahams
called in the painters. “They went wild with the possibilities of how
to change the home’s look by switching out paint colors, and they
did a fantastic job.”
“It was nothing short of a transformation,” Jim says about the
project, and jokingly adds that the green-blue stain “was seriously the
ugliest trim color known to mankind.”
“It’s true,” Jamie responds. “We lived with it for 20 years then finally
decided to do something about it. In fact, we painted practically every
inch of the house—from the entry, hallway, kitchen, family and living
rooms downstairs, to the four bedrooms upstairs and bathrooms.”
The Grahams traveled to their second home in South Carolina for
three months while the work was being done, giving the painters the
leeway to work uninterrupted. The crew unhinged every door, cabinet
and window jam. The elaborate crown molding in the entryway
received special treatment. The painters lightly sanded off the glossy
stain, caulked and mitered all joints for a seamless finish, then primed
10 724.942.0940 TO ADVERTISE | Murrysville
and painted everything. The first coat
had a satin finish, and for the final
one they used high-gloss enamel. High
gloss works well when you have the molding
detail to pull it off—which the Grahams have in their coffered ceiling.
The Grahams favor monochromatic tones, so the painters gathered
various cream-hued paints to pull together the rest of the house.
The kitchen cabinets, as well as the living and dining rooms, feature
a warm cream, which is echoed up the staircase. The painters did a
feature on the stairway they discovered down South. They accented
just the handrails and knoll posts with a rich chocolate brown by
Sherwin Williams called Umber. It’s dedicated to the staircase only,
so it really stands out. It’s gorgeous, especially with the addition of
Oriental runners in complementary colors.
The walls in the foyer and hallway are a lovely, soft wash of muted
colors with intermittent cream, and all moldings upstairs repeat the
monochromatic tone. They like the continuity of maintaining a trim
shade so that all the rooms flow into each other.
Upstairs, the bedrooms were freshened from their individual colors
to a uniform shade of Pewter Grey. Warm, classic grey is the new
neutral, and it’s very easy to decorate around. One upstairs bathroom
adds a pop of color with a cheerful French yellow in a flat finish, which
gives it dimension and character.
The end result? “Changing just the paint colors brightened the
entire house,” Jamie concludes. “It’s like we added 25 skylights. The
whole place looks amazing, and now when we see that 40-feet-high
paneled ceiling in the foyer, we can really appreciate it. It really is like
we’ve been living in our d