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Kitchen ceilings other than white?

15 years ago

We have 10 ft ceilings and may (or may not) put in stained beams up for a decorative touch. However, I've read where the ceiling is your 5th "wall" and it's good to throw a color on it other than white. I just don't think we'll be repainting it any time soon, if ever, after we paint it once so I want be fairly sure I'm not going to hate a color on it. Anyone paint their ceiling and love it? Hate it? If you did what color? And what color were your walls? Anyone do it the same color as their walls (DH wants to do this and use power paint sprayer! Not sure about this...)

Our kitchen is open to our living room so we'll be doing the whole ceiling in the same color, no matter what.

Any ideas and photos would be so helpful.

TIA!

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Comments (12)

rmkitchen
15 years ago
We did our (kitchen) ceilings a 50% version of our wall color (which is Benjamin Moore Pearl River) for precisely the reason you mentioned -- I didn't want a vast white space. You would never look at our kitchen ceiling and say "wow! that's not white / it's a color!" but because it's related to the wall color I find it easier on the eye to make the transition, if that makes sense.

These photos show the color on the ceiling (it's so subtle it's hard to see):

In the photo on the right, you can see the wall color around the window.

And this is the kitchen as a whole, standing in the family room, so you can see how subtle the effect is:

Our ceilings are 9'.
sailormann
15 years ago
I always paint my ceilings - usually in the same manner as rmkitchen. We start with the wall colour and lighten it up with white until it looks right for the room and the lighting.
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My husband was against a white kitchen, because it shows dirt more than any other color. Would that rationale work for yours? You could also do your uppers in white and your lowers in the pearl gray. I see a disconnect between the shapes and sizes of your cabinets and what your dream kitchens look like. With that beautiful window that goes to the ceiling, I can see why other posters want you to move your upper cabinets up. That would complement the window and feel complete. Right now, the upper cabinets are like a band of brown around the perimeter of your kitchen. But moving the cabs up won't be very practical that high, unless you and your husband play for the NBA: You will need a stool to reach them. I think rather than uniformly moving the cabinets, you should customize them. 1. Take down the uppers on both sides of the window and next to the refrigerator. (Loss of 5 upper cabinets) 2. ReUSE the double-door cabinet currently to the left of the window over to the left of the refrigerator (now you've only lost 3 upper cabinets). 3. If you do want more storage, have a glass door cabinet made. Based on your dream pix, I suspect you are yearning for a china cabinet that goes down to counter height. One cabinet like that is $1-2k? by a local cabinet maker. You may have to hunt for him. 4. Open shelves are a more economical alternative. I myself took off half the cabinets that go over my peninsula. I had a cabinet with glass doors on both sides built for the other half. It was big change, and yet I didn't miss the cabinets I took out. Unless you have an upper lazy susan, I suspect that corner cab is deep and hard to use, anyway. Removing those cabinets will give more focus on your window, your one Victorian detail, and open up the kitchen. Together with your paint color, it will all look more true to the house and less show-room. Your other option would be to keep the existing cabinets, but maybe take off some of the doors. Replace one set with glass doors. Maybe install a wine rack or display shelves in another one. It would be ideal if you could remove the backsplash. It sounds like your walls will need a bit of patching and smoothing before tile installation anyway, so this would just be a little more area to cover. Regarding the chips in your granite, some edge details are more prone to chipping than others, and especially so around the sink, where pans and dishes keep hitting against that edge. So, the install itself may have been perfectly good; just a poor decision on that sink edge. Good luck!
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edlakin
15 years ago
we did stamped tin on our ceiling
mfrog
15 years ago
We had 10'+ ceilings in our last house & I painted the ceilings in the entire house "butternut squash". I had quite different colours for the walls in most of the rooms & it went very well.
The only picture of the ceilings I have is in the parlour.
{{!gwi}}
caminnc
15 years ago
Here are a couple. The first is a breakfast room but you could do the kitchen like this as well.
cbreeze
15 years ago
How about this ?
sarafina2008
15 years ago
I love this post! We're in the middle of our remodel and put a recessed ceiling in and plan on having rope lighting in it and I wasn't sure if we should paint the high part a different color or not.
sue36
15 years ago
Our walls are Behr Cornerstone (sort of a vanilla color). When I repaint (after backsplash goes in) I plan to switch to a similar color (probably Farrow & Ball) and paint the ceiling the same color as the walls. The color is light, so I don't think the painted ceiling will feel oppressive. My ceilings are only 8'3" in the kitchen. When I repaint the great room (not until it needs it) I will paint the ceiling a color darker than the walls (currently Asian Jute) in order to lower it (it's 17') and will add crown molding at that point as well.

My master bedroom has all kinds of slanted ceiling angles so we painted it all the same color (the Cornerstone again). I'm going to repaint it all green, maybe EK Tulip Leaves (still unsure). I'm a little more afraid of this one because the ceiling is only 10'6" or so and it will be a LOT of green.

I would go for it. But roll it with a low nap roller, don't spray.
slc2053
Original Author
15 years ago
sue36..why a low nap roller...and not spray? Our walls and ceilings are plaster so the surface is rough...
oruboris
15 years ago
I've got beams and beadboard on my 8ft ceiling. Beams are cinnamon, beads are carmel. Looks great.

I'd have done stamped tin, but felt my space was too low. The beam&bead is appropriate to my area and the design era I was going for.
beachbum
15 years ago
Ours is the same color as the walls. It is a very light taupe.
keepingitsimple
15 years ago
just like most others, we put a lighter shade of our wall color on the ceilings.

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