Monday, April 9, 2012

Beach House Blues and shabby sconces


Hello! I hope you had a wonderful Easter weekend.

I have been trying to find the perfect blue for our living and dining room while Todd has been sanding down the original baseboards, prepping them for paint. Together we looked at colour chips over and over, ok, well I looked over and over and Todd would say, yeah, maybe that will look good. Excited he likes my suggestion of Benjamin Moore's Seafoam, I get a sample can and paint it on the wall. He looks at it and says that he can't even see it and doesn't like it. It is on the far left below. 

Then I think, ok well maybe we should not even consider so light as it seems to look to precious next to the kitchen and so I try the opposite of my idea for our space.
 So off I go to get a computer match done of a coloured card I have carried around in my purse for quite some time, which I love the colour of. I put it on the wall only to realize that it is 
waaaaaay tooo dark for me. So I think hey why don't I just lighten it up myself  
   by mixing 1 part paint to 2 parts of plain base which gives me the colour on the right.


and I still find it a little dark still and not quite right tone I wanted.
The small square chip is Benjamin Moore's Ocean Air and the colour I'm going for is very similar just not as dark.


Then I took a break from the stress of figuring out a paint 
colour while Todd worked on  stripping the windows.



 and so I decided to place a few pieces in the room to create 
the feeling I wanted.
And then I remembered.......   
stored in the attic,  
two shabby chic antique glass light sconces that my
 father gave me many years ago that we had  rewired and never installed anywhere.



So I had begged Todd to install one, yes just one, on the left side of the pocket doors as we had not wired for one on the other side. 
Since the TV is going in the corner to the right side of the pocket doors,  I had envisioned an industrial style single sconce only but once we got a look at how amazing this looked, we  realized that we needed to install the other one.
When we had the sconces rewired professionally, they had to attach a round plate to the back for the bracket to have something to attach the electrical box to the light. It will get painted out the same colour as the wall and I'm hoping will unnoticeable. I just love the silver patina and the glass bolts as well as the little flip switch on the bottom  (that is no longer aloud to function by code).


I have to confess that the wall colour in the dining room is really awful looking to me now and I can't wait to get it painted too.




I do like that I can see it from the kitchen as well. Todd had suggested putting them in our hallway upstairs but I didn't want to place them somewhere where I couldn't enjoy them more often. 



and now here they are in a pair. I just love symmetry and I also
 think they will visually link the the living room to the dining room when we have a nice chandelier hanging in the place of the hurricane lantern. 


So back to the paint colours.
  I ask Todd to run and get a sample of Para's Kangaroo Eyes for me, a colour that would look like a deeper Seafoam colour. 
When he returns he tells me that the girl couldn't get the formula to work so she took one of their paint chips of their lines and matched it and mixed it up!
(between me and you I think my honey is a little colour blind)
I was hesitant but tried it anyway and it wasn't a good match for the colour chip afterall. I was a little peeved and was going to return it and get my money back but then realize that one colour was a little too blue grey and the other was a little blue green.




So I got creative again and mixed up without measuring accurately the supposed Kangaroo Eyes with some of my previously lighter custom colour and WHALA! I found my perfect colour which is at the far left.
Now I have my fingers crossed that someone can computer match this exactly because it will be too complicated to duplicate the formula the way I did it.
It is so perfect, not too grey, not too green, not too light or dark,
just PERFECT!


Well there is much prep still to do before the painting and I am praying that I can get my custom colour mixed up no problem.


4 comments:

Claudia said...

Hello,
It's looking good... Love the ceiling! Can't wait to see what color you pick. The colors are all so soothing.
Take care,
Claudia

Muddaritaville said...

Sandra, the floors look A-Maz-ing!!!
I also love the lights and the paint colour.

I've nominated you for a Versatile Blogger award for more details view my post at http://muddaritaville.blogspot.ca/2012/04/versatile-blogger-award.html

Jo
PS. I know these things take time so only do it if you have the time.

Serendipitous Home said...

Oh Jo!
Thank you for such nice words!
You are so sweet to include me. I look forward to participating when I get the next chance.

Sandra

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