Thanks for the advice! I was actually going to use the Mapei pre-mixed and ready to use flexcolorCQ tub of grout to avoid any color variances. It comes at a price premium, but that seems to be worth it to remove any unexpected surprises. Do you have any experience with that version of the product?

You have lots of great suggestions and I don't know anything about paint color but I will just mention something that I did many years ago. We were moving from out of state to a home that we were going to redecorate and needed to remove all the wall paper through out the entire house. I was living in another state waiting for our house to sell so my visits to the "new" house was every other week or so. After all the paper was removed, I decided to just paint the whole house a light cream with white trim. Got lots of paints chips, picked out the two colors - looked just great together in the light of the new house. My DH had a painter come in to paint the whole house before we moved in any furniture. I show up one day before the painter is almost finished. Open the front door and ugh - something is definitely wrong! Seems I did not know the first basic rule of white - there is such a thing as a "cool" white and a "warm" white. I had chosen one of each and they looked just dreadful when up on the walls and trimmed together. Luckily, we were able to call in a decorator who quickly picked a color to change the walls with (to repaint the trim and doors would have been too expensive and time consuming) and we were able to move in with no delay. So my only advice as far as paint color goes is . . . with a light cream on the walls, be sure the white works - don't just rely on the paint chip. I think your inspiration picture is very calming and serene. HTH a little. Chris

If you want pure white, best to avoid 'ceiling paint' which always seem to have very gray tones. I love pure white paint and have been happy w/ Behr's Ultra Pure White. Zinsser's Perma White is also a good pure white that I've used in bathrooms. (It has anti-mildew additives.)

Behr's Ultra White is the cleanest, most white out all the major commercial brands. And it's a pretty color. Don't use a ceiling white. None of them are pretty. They all have a weird, alien blue-green-grayness. My favorite pretty ceiling color is PPG's Delicate White. It's not bright-white-white. But it's slightly warm and when viewed on the ceiling, horizontally over your head, it doesn't look dead and gray like the colors labeled "ceiling white" will. And you don't have to use "ceiling paint" on the ceiling. A mid-grade flat paint works just as well, maybe even better in terms of coverage because a lot of those "ceiling" paints have crappy hide.