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Home Decorating Exterior

Need help with exterior house colors; shutters, front door.

4 years ago

I want to paint my house shutters and front door as the current color is outdated (forest green). So I need some advice. I've seen that there's a trend now to let the front door pop with a different color than the rest, and I think it would be nice to do something fun or cute on the front door. But unsure if that's OK when you have shutters? Does the front door need to match the shutters?

If it's OK to let the door be a different color, I could use some advice.

Here are my current colors:

House siding: Cream colored, the best color match I could find from the samples I have at home is this one: (Although on my computer it looks almost pinkish toupe! My house is cream, not really yellow but more so than off-white.) Valspar Courtyard Tan 7002-13 https://m.valsparpaint.com/color-detail.php?id=2649&g=1017

The roof, if it matters, is Teak, from Owens Corning: https://www.owenscorning.com/roofing/shingles/trudefinition-duration/

(My current shutters are forest green, a common green from the 90's. But I want that gone.

See pictures of the house on the bottom.)

FYI: The front of the house faces north, so if I go anything dark it will look nearly black most of the day. So I'd like to go in the medium color ranges. Preferably no red or orange.

1. Is the roof color considered neutral since it's in the brown tones? Like wood? Can I do whatever I want of color as long as it matches the siding?

2. Can I do shutters in this blue https://www.behr.com/consumer/ColorDetailView/HDC-AC-24 with front door in a light blue such as https://www.ppgpaints.com/color/color-families/neutrals/shaded-brook OR https://www.behr.com/consumer/ColorDetailView/HDC-CT-26 OR https://www.behr.com/consumer/ColorDetailView/N440-2 ?

3. Are neutral shutter colors better? If so, do you have some suggestions?

4. Any other suggestions as to what might look good on the front door?

Here's our house currently; the white decorative pieces will be painted too (white) as they are very gray and grimy now. It was hard to get the colors right in the pictures, that's why I included links above to get you a better idea.

A sample of the siding compared to a paint color chart:

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Comments (4)

PRO
JudyG Designs
4 years ago
last modified: 4 years ago
Very first impression is there are way too many narrow shutters and none fit the windows properly. What is not taken advantage off is the mill work over the windows. If painted the white of the windows, the windows would be lovely without the shutters. Shiny red front door…..
Sammy
4 years ago
I agree with Judy about removing the shutters. If you do that, though, you’ll need to beef up the window trim. (Well, you don’t need to, but it’d look better.)
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How about a "blueberry"--very grayed-down blue. That color would be a complement to the warm rust of your brick & would liven things up without taking over. Also Williamsburg blue--a greyed blue-green--might work; that would be more interesting than plain dark green.
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We did something similar recently. Our house is also cream. Unless you're going to install a different size or style of shutters, Instead of replacing them, just have them painted. It's less expensive and you'll end up with the same results. We went with a dark teal on the shutters and love it! Then for the door, depending on the what you like, you could do red, gray, a fun apple green or a lighter shade of the teal. They were hunter green before. This is the shade we chose but I've included some other options below. My husband wouldn't agree to painting the door, but this was my inspiration for it. I love the way it looks.
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Is the paint color an off white (cream)? If so, you color options are basically endless, depending what color your roof is or if you have any brick or stone on the house. When choosing paint colors for my house a couple of years ago, I kept in mind the color of stone on the front of my house, the brick on my chimney color, and my green roof. I then went to Behr's website and played with color combinations and found something that both my husband and I agreed on. With the color of your house in mind and what looks like a dark roof, maybe black, there are so many color combinations you could go with. Here are some photos for inspiration: I absolutely love the colors on this house. More importantly--What colors do you and your family love? Next is a photo of my house since I could not find any other photos that would suit your house on Houzz. I chose paints from Behr Marquee and the house color is Taupe Tease, trim is Superior Blue (my husband's favorite color), and the doors are Fire Cracker Red (my favorite color): All 3 colors work well together and work with the roof, brick, and stone colors as well. I also chose colors that no one else had in our neighborhood.
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Comments (20)
Thank you all very much for your input - especially those who went to the effort of making "renderings," how kind of you. Those were very useful, and helped me to realize that black is the right option, given my general risk-adverseness. The shutters and front door will be SW Tricorn Black. I'll post a pic when everything is done. I never even thought of painting the garage doors but you guys are right, I think black would look really good. We're not going to have the painters do it (given they JUST painted them white) but that seems like a job my husband and I can easily tackle ourselves down the line.
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Else
Original Author
4 years ago
I did think about removing them, but there are screw holes in the siding. Each shutter has four screws, one in each corner. The ones close to the windows could be covered by trim, but not the outer ones. So how would I deal with that?
Else
Original Author
4 years ago
I'm still interested in advice for colors for keeping the shutters as I'm not sold on the idea of removing them. I might, but I think the house will look pretty washed out without them. It would help if the siding was a bit darker. But it is what it is.

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