Sometimes I say "live with it", but maybe not in this case since you have the equipment and motivation now. It won't be easy afterwards, like repainting a room. Even though the green is not that noticeable, it isn't quite right and your house is beautiful. It doesn't seem like it's the biggest job in the world, so if you're willing, do it. You will be happier.

I agree with andee. I'd go ahead and do it now. I had a somewhat similar situation when we remodeled the kitchen. I also had the contractors repaint the family room. It was formerly paneling which had already been painted over once. It needed priming and an oil based paint which I wasn't thrilled about having to deal with.

Once they were done I hated the color. I wanted to just pay the contractor to do another color but DH said no way. So... I went ahead and did it myself. Huge job and much bigger pain than regular sheetrock type painting but in the end I'm so glad I did it. Like andee said, I had the motivation then and might not have later.

I agree with andee and lowspark, you will be much happier in the long run.

Well, maybe, but how big a fight will you have with your hubby? Is a week's worth of hellish work and a week-long fight with your husband worth it to you? You have a lovely home, and if you say there are greenish undertones in real life, there must be. I can't see them on my monitor.

We just stained our house, a rust color. LOVE it....if I didn't I'd restain it....I say....DO IT!

I would definitely restain it. I would not want to be reminded of what I could have done eveytime I pulled into the driveway.

I don't think it looks that bad, but if you're going to go through the effort of restaining it, I would make sure the color is EXACTLY what you want and is a big enough difference to make it worth your while.

Many times my DH has told me he won't do something BUT once I start, he's right by my side. Hopefully you'll get as lucky if you do decide to go ahead. Good luck!!

Well, if you are anything like me, I would paint it and like dawn, my DH would pitch in.

I say put the additional coat of stain on if you are like me because it would annoy me every time I looked at the house, and it is such a lovely home.

Maybe I should have posted on that thread what are you particular about. I am particular about certain colors matching. I blame it on my mother dressing me in garanimals all the time when I was a kid. :) Hmmm. I think I might be giving away my age with that comment. I wonder if they still make garanimals is still around making matchy clothes.

I think it looks great now. Of course, it's one of my favorite shades of green.

Your husband might be much more understanding than mine. :) After 40 years I know my husband and he would not be happy. He might begrudgingly agree to stain it again or help me do it. But, it wouldn't be a pleasant experience for either of us and I'd always remember it when I looked at the finished product.

I think the golden garage doors make the green of the siding more pronounced. I'd paint those the siding color to make them less dominant. First coat I'd try in the current siding color to see if I liked it then (be careful with the sheen as it will lighten the color). Unless you don't like green itself so much, carrying the siding color across the whole house would blend it with all the browns and grays and make the facade more cohesive overall. I'd be thinking of painting the front door color a buff with those colors. (Not sure about a gray or what type of gray you're planning.) I'd also be considering stain for the concrete driveway in a medium warm gray pulled from the brick, leaving the walk to the entrance light.

Do it. You won't be happy unless you do. I see the green you're talking about,and understand why you want it more brown. We just recently painted our family room because I couldn't stand the yellow in our gold walls clashing with the peanut butter colored sofa during the day. We needed a caramel color in the paint. At night, though, it looked great. When we first painted swatches of the new color on the wall, my husband challenged my DD to tell the difference. She couldn't. But once he started painting, he could see the difference and agreed how much better it looked. Maybe once you start staining, your DH will see that you're right, and will join in. If not, you'll have wonderful self-satisfaction that YOU solved the problem yourself.
Dee

I see the green undertone and I like it a lot!

OK, I see green, and I'm not jus talking about a sort of greenish undertone. It's definitely green. But I'm with Oakleyoak: I think that the green is absolutely what makes the whole thing work, and for the very reason that it DOESN'T match the brick. Or the trim. It's a much more sophisticated approach to do it this way.

There's another advantage to leaving it the way it is. Even though your husbnad says he won't help, and that you'd have to do it yourself, he'll always remember that you redid the whole thing even though, as you, yourself admitted, that there isn't much difference in the two colors. Why provide him with a specific, concrete example of how difficult you are to please? One that he'll be sure to bring up in years to come? Just remmeber, ten years down the road, when you want to change something else, this will run through his mind and he'll be less likely--not more-to give in. After all, if you weren't happy and insisted on changing something as minor as two colors you yourself can barely tell apart, what are the chances that you'll be happy with that newer choice? Whereas if you just accept this throughtly acceptable color siding, he'll remember how open to reason you are. That can only work to your advantage.

A story: twenty-five years ago--back when I was still working in the engineering department of the Phone Company and decorating was just a hobby--a woman hired me to redo the second story of a large Craftsman-style bungalow, so that she could use it for summer guests coming to visit. We had picked a pale grayish duck-egg blue for a room that looked out onto a nwewer addition with a poorly-chosen pale-gray asphalt roof that was all wrong for the style of the house. The roof was ugly but it did have the advantage of reflecting a lot of light into the room, light that the other rooms didn't get, and which this room wouldn't have had either, had the new roof's color been chosen to match the dark orangey-brown tile roof of the main house. Like they say, even a stopped clock is right twice a day.

Anyway, I had already painted a small section of one wall when the woman came home unexpectedly on her lunch hour, looked at the color in the can, looked at the small patch on a wall that had formerly been a bright white and announced that it was much, MUCH too dark, and that it would have to be lightened considerably before she would accept it.

I knew she was judging by the color in the can--never a good idea--and by the strong contrast between the fresh blue paint and the much brighter white paint around it, so I went through the charade of of mixing some of the "too dark" paint with some white, and then, while she watched, started daubing it on top of the blue patch. She sttod there watching me go through my little show for a few minutes, and when she left to go back to work, I told her she'd love the room when I got done. Then I went ahead & finished the job with the paint I had originally chosen.

When her car pulled into the drive at 6:30, the pale roof out the windows was bouncing late-afternoon light around the room, and the morning's hard contrasts between the old white paint & the new blue paint had been eliminated, giving an etheral, beachy feel to the room without anything as obvious as deck chairs or bowls of seashells. It was nothing more than fresh paint & the breezes coming through the open windows. She walked into the room and said "YES! This is MUCH better! I'm SO glad I stopped you before you went ahead with that OTHER color. It was A-L-L-L wrong."

Magnaverde Rule No. 3O: Sometimes the easiest thing to change is our attitude.

I think the siding reads a pretty, mossy brown, which is great because it compliments but doesnt match the brick.

Instead of spending the time, effort and money changing the siding, I would change the color of whatever it is on the peaks of the rooflines (natural cedar, perhaps?) I would stain those the same color as the siding. I am guessing they are going to age and change color, but at least at the moment they kind of feel like a repair job. Now, perhaps that is a trend and I just donÂt know that, so if I am out of the loop on this, just ignore the suggestion.

I would do the garage doors the same color as the siding. Do the front door in a richer color like a brown-red, or a rich navy, or a much deeper shade of the siding color. Grey will only seem like you added another factor into the mix that is trying to blend and doesnÂt.

You have a lovely home, and I really do think the siding color contributes to that, green undertone and all.

Have you thought about this? What if you pick a new color and you don't like that either? I had my house painted in May. I hated it at the time but I have decided to live with it. The main reason I haven't changed it is because I am concerned that my next choice might not work either. I think exterior colors are hard.

Another thing that got me over it was starting a new project to worry about ;-)

Well it's up to you but for what it's worth, I think your house and siding are so pretty!

If I were driving by your house I would think to myself, now that's a pretty house and I love how the colors work together. Maybe it's because I'd like those colors on my house! No matter what, you have to do what makes you happy. Whatever you choose will be the right choice.

On my monitor, I see the green undertones, and I think it looks great as is!

Restaining would be a lot of work to achieve what would probably be a fairly subtle change. Wouldn't you rather spend the week at the pool? Summer will be over all too soon!

I'm going to ditto others and say that I like the subtle difference. Any more similar and I think it would be really boring. I would consider bringing a little more color in other ways like in some flowers or a punchier front door.

Thank you for all your opinions and kind comments! Now, you can colour me...... CONFUSED? My eye says the green doesn't match the brick, but the "forum" says that's OK. ????

There is no green in the brick, just flecks of brown & tan. How does the green work?

And then, what colour would you paint the front door? I hear brown-red or navy??

The new cedar ridge caps on the roof are distracting too (No, not a trend, just a repair job, they will fade)

Thanks for all your help, I'm still on the fence about what to do........

The "forum" is about evenly split, it seems -- torn like you are. I think it's about trade-offs at this point. You (some of us, too) don't like the green (whether or not others think it is fine). As someone above said, you have to look at it every time you drive up. It's not going to change. Sometimes, we can change our attitude about that, sometimes we can't, sometimes we have to live with it regardless. We each like what we like.

If you can manage the restaining yourself and would gladly do it because it is what you want and you know it will make a big difference to you (and DH is ok with it), then do it (with the caveat that you need to be really sure about the new color -- can you do a trial board -- new stain over old?). If you really can't or won't do it yourself, then you can work on mitigating the color with finishing the garage door and front door and landscaping. At least you know that a lot of people like the look.

I'm unsure about your original message. You say the garage will be stained the same color as the trim. The trim looks painted to me, and the garage looks about the same as the trim. Did you mean the garage will be stained the same color as the siding that you don't like?

I think you need to answer the question about your ability and willingness to re-stain before anything else.

Hi, garage doors will be stained the siding colour NOT the trim color, sorry about that.

I am able and willing to re-stain and think I will probably do it, although the weather is not cooperating. I might have to get them to doctor up the stain a bit more, to ensure a noticeable difference...so I don't kick myself if the difference is not that noticeable!!!

I really like the siding color and think it looks fine with the brick color. What I'm not crazy about is the trim color with the siding color, though I don't hate it or anything.The siding is more gray and the trim is more brown. I would just paint the trim color something that goes better with the siding.

But if you hate the siding color and you feel that you could redo it, then that's what you should do.

The colour of the house is fine, it's the horrid garage doors which spoil it.

I would leave it and punch it up with some accessories. Think black with a little river rock to extend the walkway. Lovely home! Green goes with brown and tan. http://s795.photobucket.com/albums/yy232/door1_2009/?action=view&current=fillagirlfront.jpg

I love the color with the brick.

Hi fillagirl. If you can find a way to accept the green tone, I would advise you to keep it, as I think it looks interesting this way! As long as I am doling out advice, I would put the money into getting larger light fixtures (with perhaps some craftsman character, if you like that look) for the garage! Thank you for sharing photos of your gorgeous home!
FW

No one has covered the issue of whether you're really capable of staining the siding. Have you put together scaffolding and stained siding while standing on a steep shake roof? What I'm looking at is not an easy job and I don't blame your DH for refusing to do it again.

Like others here have said, I'd leave it as is, paint/stain the garage doors, change out the lights and paint the front door. It looks great!

I think the color looks great with the brick! Your home is just beautiful. I really like the roofing too. Nice job!

Jan

I like the green. But the garage doors and front door need to be painted a different color - same green as siding for garage doors, and a contrasting (rusty?) color for the front door. Then I think the trim will work, though if possible I'd paint/stain the trim around the garage doors as well just to make them "disappear".

Fill

The house is lovely. I guess those of us on GW like to help the OP, sometimes translates to more confusion.

In any event - The color "works" because if it was an exact match to the brick it would read monotone. The existing color provides delineation between brick & siding in a subtle way.

For what it is worth - I would stain the garage doors and paint the front door before making a determination about restaining the siding. You may be surprised how the colors read once you do that -look at the house & take pics at different times of day too.

I would paint some poster boards with your possible front door colors & hang them on the door. I think something in the burgundy family would be suiting.

best to you

Honestly, I rather like it. I get what you're feeling tho, have felt the same torment many times, and only you know the degree it's nagging at you. ;)

Were it me I'd zero in on the front door. The whole scheme seems to need a little something (to me) just as a splash of alternate color, even if not vibrant. It would only take a day to get a first coat on & see if a new door color makes you content with the big picture.

Has your paint store encouraged a second stain application with that subtle undertone tweak? Something isn't quite sitting right with me from a technical aspect. (Maybe one of the resident pros over in Paint who use exterior stains often could address that.) I ask only because stain is not like paint in that it absorbs into rather than sits on the surface. Granted I've only used solid stains on exterior fencing & prior deck. But it just seems to me that from a technical aspect a second application that's not really discernibly different from the first might not give the desired end result as it absorbs into what's there. Versus paint which would coat right over a prior layer. I hope that line of thought makes sense.

Side note to KK: I've been wondering how your house turned out. Bummer to hear the 'real life' color didn't make you do cartwheels on the lawn. Such a pretty house!

SO WHAT DID SHE DO?

Thank you all for weighing in and for your photoshop door1...

Yesterday, I bit the bullet and started staining. It is a very subtle difference but I like it much better! We only two walls of the 2nd storey & garage doors to stain and then we're done ! DD has camera in Florida so will post pics once she is back.

And.... DH did pitch in!

NEXT STEPS:

- Pick new colour for front door
- Put up larger black sidelights on each side of garage & spray-paint house numbers black.
-Put black urns on each side of garage doors.

Thanks again for your help - it really does help to have other opinions & suggestions and objective & skilled viewpoints!

You're welcome fillagirl! It's great to hear that you resolved this. Like I said before, your home is lovely and I think the black would punctuate it. I wish that I could have gotten my pic to show to see what other people thought about the black but "no such luck" I am looking forward to seeing pictures when it is finished. It's wonderful that your DH pitched in and helped!