Choosing the Perfect Paint Color for a Modern Office

I had the idea to do my office in gray with white furniture and bright lime or turquoise accents, but I could NOT find a decent gray!  Gray is a great neutral that's not beige (the color of my office before the reno) and really provides a great backdrop for crisp lines.

I was feeling really cheap, so I took a half gallon of paint from my MIL thinking it would be the perfect gray.  It wasn't.  It was much too light and a half gallon wouldn't cover all four walls!  So I started researching grays and realized how many different grays there are.  There's brown-gray, purple-gray, blue-gray, and the undertones in each affect the room accessories.

After scouring the web for hours, I found the perfect gray on Emily A. Clarke's Blog http://emilyaclark.blogspot.com/.  Emily had the same idea for home office colors, and she's an interior decorator, so I knew I could trust her.

Here's a picture of Emily's office, which served as inspiration for my final product:

The paint used is Benjamin Moore's Trout Gray 2124-20.

 

I was concerned that Trout Gray would be too dark and soak up all the light in the room, but Deep Silver (a shade lighter) wasn't a good background for white.  When I saw it in pictures online, the white furniture didn't "pop" as much as I wanted it to, so Trout Gray it was!

At the hardware store, I asked for a custom mix of Trout Gray 75% lighter.  When custom mixing a color make sure to  err on the side of pale.  It's better to make the paint light and add pigment if it turns out too light.  You can always add pigment, but you can't take it out.

I bought the eggshell finish with primer included to make my job easier.

Total Cost, including paint rollers: $44.