Color my world

Our house is progressing. Not so quickly however, so that we will actually be moving in on our possession date! We are about 2 weeks behind. And on top of this I am horrified (yes completely revolted) by my own color scheme for the house. I keep questioning how this happened - I consider myself very good at coordinating an interior. If my last house was any indication, it is obvious that I had a flair once upon a time!!!

Our house in Halifax was a soothing mix of tone on tone shades of creamed coffee with a couple of punches of red. This house, I decided, needed to be different, more color, more drama, more punch.

Last night I went to inspect the paint job.

The main color throughout is called coffee body scrub, which is a very soothing creamy color with just a drop of green. It has a lovely spa quality to it. This color wraps the entry way, and is continuous down the hall, into the office, second bedroom and both baths. It looks great against the maple floors as well as the tile going into the bathrooms. So what's the problem you ask?...

Let's start with the living/dining room. I chose (what I thought was) a very earthy purple. Quite honestly, not that bad. Granted it is a bit Barneyfied, but not awful. Push comes to shove I can make it work with the coffee body scrub. Actually no I can't, unless I buy new everything, given that my current decor is not purple friendly.

Add in the kitchen. In the last house I had great success with red. But reds are finicky. You have to have just the right red, in just the right light or it doesn't work. Turns out, cajun shrimp is an angry red and doing a great job of pissing off the other colors. It especially dislikes where it seams up against Barney. The cabinets are yet to be installed. Initially I thought the red would look fab against the stained wood, but now I fear the two will just fight against each other and make the kitchen too dark. Too much intensity amongst all the materials - the cabinets are stained, the appliances are stainless, the island countertop is also stainless and the floors are hardwood. Already a lot of drama even before I started cooking up cajun shrimp!

No, the paint doesn't stop here. Our bedroom. Because the summer days are so long here I decided on a brown called cocoa glow. Wow, now that is a saturated color. They also painted the inside of the closet this color (I forgot to tell them otherwise), which means I will not know what the heck is in there - no reflective quality to this paint.

So the drama I was hoping to get in my house has created a great deal of tension in both me and hubby. Fuck. I just wanted it to work out the first time and be fabulous.

Looks like I will be painting after all. Time is too tight and the painter has no time to come back and redo my faux pas. So next week while hubby is installing hardwood floors I will be priming and painting kitchen, living and master - you know, only half the house.