My wife and I bought our first home recently and are struggling to choose a paint color for our "shared" kitchen and dining room. We are hoping for some ideas/tips.

Some details:

• where wood beam is (in photos) used to be wall that separated rooms
• we think it should be one single paint color (since now we don't have walls differentiating rooms)
• cabinets will be white shaker, and we will likely have a white subway tile backsplash of some sort
• countertops will be mixed gray/white engineered stone
• peninsula separating rooms will be knotty pine base stained with a "special walnut"
• beam will be wrapped/finished with stain to match peninsula base
• hardware likely to be a brushed gold

Photos:

This view is from wall of kitchen that will host cabinets, fridge, stove, under cabinet range hood (stainless steel), facing towards the dining room.

Farmhouse sink to go under window, with dishwasher to right. Peninsula will divide the space and go out towards where our confused furr-ball Jack is standing.

View from living room into dining room (before molding was put in). Floors are this wood/finish throughout. Living room color is a light-ish grey that we'd like to keep. Jack just wants this to be done with.

The kitchen itself won't have much paint showing due to the backsplash and limited space (covered by our cabinets/appliances) but we'd love something to contrast all the white cabinets, countertops, and trim. One thought we had was it might be smarter to wait for everything else to be installed before choosing the color.

We'd appreciate any thoughts. Thank you!