Rachel - thank you - you shared great photos - I will post pictures next week after the walls and trim are painted in Dove White. I really like that black paint idea on fireplace- such a bold move but I love the white fireplaces you show which seem safer. Black happens to be in the wallpaper I am currently hanging in the foyer today. Pics attached. Changing trim and walls white all over the house is a huge transformation from my dingy dark trim and walls and I am creating a monster that is snowballing. The dining room rug looks horrible with my wallpaper so I am now in search of a new rug there and one for the family room and now I need new furniture in there as well. Suggestions are welcome from anyone - It is painted Dove white and you can see the new foyer paper with the new blue study. What about a blue or green velvet sofa with all white room. I have 2 cats and someone said that they are not as attracted to velvet. I am not painting the built-ins around fireplace just yet because I have not picked out kitchen cabinets. Maybe I can have the built-ins sprayed white or the blue??? I could also try to change the trim or molding to make them more modern and even wonder if wood shelves would look good to match my dream beams. Ripping out the built-ins and replacing will be costly unless I find some cool furniture pieces to go there. I will also hold off on the painting the fireplace so I can see what the brick looks with an all white room. My painters love me and they come back every two weeks for my next Phase of renovation. : )

Thanks all! Glad to know I can stick w/all Simply White - I had a million other whites and griege colors but the SW almost glowed. We've expanded all the windows so I want to maximize the light-and-bright feel. At the same time I love color so it's a little hard for me to walk away from a chance to have a big bold paint color in every room. We'll have a lot of old Persian carpets plus some changing out furniture and linens so maybe that's where I'll go a little wilder. @Judy Graham, the window pictured is staying and is sized for egress. Originally there was a second window on the wall opposite the map that was removed when we added a new master suite. The plan called for a skylight but due to the truss structure it will have to be only 14" wide, smaller than originally anticipated. Overall the room feels a lot more compact than it did before (despite the fact that we were able to raise part of the ceiling in removing a dormer.) So I'm thinking hard about the paint here for keeping things bright.

With the gauntlet gray on the siding, and white on the trim, windows, and post, I'd keep the garage doors white. I think the contrast would be nice since they are surrounded by the stone, but the gauntlet gray could also work. I'd order them in white and you can decide when they're installed. You could use white on the front door, but I think that would look really bland. I'd either choose a stained finish or pick a color you like so it becomes a focal point. Red, blue, or black could work. You never said what color your roof was. Hopefully it's a dark charcoal, darker than the gauntlet gray?

One option for a front porch or even a smaller portico could be to use a shaped front for the porch. You could have a "point" to the roof or you could use a flat roof and still use five of the six sides of a hexagon for the shape of the porch You could use the garage wall as one side of a "hexagon" with a parallel straight side to the porch on the other side -- placing that side of the porch on either side of that first window. Take into consideration if you want that window shaded if you choose the larger porch. Your porch floor could have the two parallel straight sides and then two angled sides that meat another straight front side. The roof could have a center point with three front slopes and then te back of the front porch roof could merge into the existing roof in a traditional center ridge style. You'd have multiple "sides" to your porch to decide where you want your front sidewalk/entry point to be. You could leave an opening in the landscaping and/or railing (or screened door) so the entry is in the angle facing the driveway rather than the front straight side of the porch. Yo could also leave an opening in the railing or landscaping to exit the porch to the left toward a small front yard patio, moving your hedge forward away from the house to create a green fence for it. https://www.pinterest.com/pin/479633429035255291/