Ok, let me expand on tr65 said First let me preface it with the fact that I own and operate a store that sells BM Aura and has a web presence, I know many of my customers on line have found us through this web site. So while my post here will certainly favor BM Aura, I will try to give a unbiased explanation of everything. First of all, The Affinity Colors are special in 2 small ways. 1 They are designed(or selected) to harmonize with one another. You can pick any 3 colors and they blend together, its kind of like a "color selection for dummies system". Secondly, none of them require the use of the Aura Foundation Coat. The Foundation coat is a specialty product for use primarily with certain reds and yellows mainly from the Color Preview Collection. If you choose a color that requires it, use it! Otherwise you will not get two coat coverage. The foundation coat acts as a first coat, with the actual Aura providing the second coat, giving you the two coat coverage(You shouldn't need a coat of the foundation coat then 2 coats of finish paint). Secondly, Aura can be mixed in ANY Benjamin Moore color, and almost any competitive color. One thing you will hear, that was even mentioned in another post is that some colors do not match well. Depending on how you look at things this can be seen as true. Aura gives you a greater depth of color. It is not a full spectrum paint like EK, but it does behave more like one that traditionally mixed paints. This is why some colors do not seem to match particularly well. When you move into the world of full spectrum paints, and paints that behave more like them(such as aura) you have an issue with color metamorism, colors changing in different lighting conditions. Since I ship Aura, I always check the mixes against a color swatch just to be sure. I have had one particular instance where a color did not seem to match particularly well(and I am pretty anal about this). I wasnt going to ship the gallon. I then took it under another light source, and it was a dead on match to the chip. So did it match or not? In one light I thought it was an "ok" match, it could have been a little better, but then under another light source it was perfect. I think this is why major paint companies have stayed out of the full spectrum ring, it is very difficult to depict these lively colors on a color chip which gets produced by a printing process. Next...the colorants. If you get a gallon of Aura (or any other of Benjamin Moores new Waterborne Products, such as WB Eco-Spec, WB Ceiling Paint, or the forthcoming Natura) it will be mixed with the Aura Colorants(these are reffered to as the Genex Colorants). It doesn't matter if the color is an Affinity Color, another BM color, or a competitive color. Aura gets the "aura" colorants, not the universal(glycol) based ones. Also on this note, there was another post about people getting the Aura Colorants put into Regal Paint. I do not recommend this for a few reasons. First of all, there are no formulas to mix Regal Paints with 'Aura' colorants, so you would have to guess. While the colorants do tint in similar ways to each other, they do not tint exactly the same, so replacing the universal colorants with the aura ones is bound to cause some matching problems. Also, the universal colorant system is a 12 colorant system, aura is 13(though one of the yellows is only for the exterior line), not to mention there is no brown colorant in the aura system, where there is one in the universal system. Also note that Aura is really a 2 part deal. Both the paint and the colorants are special. If you use the Aura colorants in the Regal Paint, you don't get the benefits of what BM Calls Color Lock(that's part of Aura, not the colorants). In my opinion, Aura has a lot of good marketing points(better leveling, better coverage, very low VOC, etc) but the ColorLock is the most important and impressive. The color just does not rub off! Now, as for Afinity colors in Regal Paint. BM provides formulas for some of the Afinity colors to be mixed in Regal but not all. My experience in doing this has not been good. I tried to mix Wenge in Regal. First I scanned the chip with our color computer and mixed the formula it gave me. It came out AWEFUL; not even close. I then called BM and had them scan it for me and mixed that formula(paint companies have better equipment than you will find in any retail store for computerized color matching). It was equally bad. I also tried to mix Dinner Party in Moorglo exterior. I had the same results. After about 10 attempts to try to get that can right (including having to scoop some paint out of the can to make room for more tint), I got it close. Retailers who do not have Aura will tell you its ok, out of both lack of experience, and not wanting to miss a sale. If you do decide to try this, please.....try a quart first!!!! Personally I wont do it without explaining to the customer the results I am expecting, and saying outright, that if i do it, the can of paint is theirs, I am not promising accuracy. And frankly, it has nothing to do with preferring they buy Aura, or making a few extra dollars on a sale. We are a family owned business operating under one family for 55 years, "upselling" someone on a gallon or two of paint isn't a good long term idea for customer relations. As for a 125 year old house...One thing that I will recommend is BM's new Waterborne ceiling paint. It is in the 25-30 dollar per gallon range. I recommend it because it is a DEAD FLAT, and because of this, it hides surface imperfections like nothing else. I just used it myself and was very impressed, and its cheaper than Regal Flat (and it uses the Aura colorants, so its a Low VOC paint that stays Low VOC, even when tinted). Hope I didn't put you to sleep and gave you some good information for making your decision.

I bought 5 samples today, one of them was a white for trim so just 4 for the walls. After considering what I already have, I decided to pick ones that had different undertones. As an example, I didn't get Horizon, b/c it's so close to Paper White, and i have that color in two rooms in my current house. It's pretty, but it definitely reads blue. I think this is partly due to my trim being Snowfall White, which is very close to Simply White. I think with a truer white it might appear a little more gray, although still cool. I ended up with Intense White, which is actually what I had wanted to use in one room instead of the Paper White. Also got Shoreline 1471, which reads a little more gray than Horizon, although I feel like the purple will come out I wanted to make sure. Also got Classic Gray ElleN, I'm going to give it one more shot. And Swiss Coffee, b/c my sample is so old for that one. I feel like with what I have and the new, I should definitely be able to come up with something. I buy these small flat canvases at Walmart in a 3 pack and they work amazing for paint samples. I have found that even foam board can curl pretty easily, and I'm not a fan of painting directly on the wall anymore, have screwed that up too many times. ElleN I agree Halo is very green, so I don't think it will do me any favors. And Gray Mist is not a very fun color, but I can't believe it looked so yellow on your walls. I think you're right, they might have mixed something wrong. Here's a couple of pics of our old kitchen with it. It was a great neutral with the floors, cabinets and countertops.

Without seeing the floors, it’s very hard to say, but somewhere in this post you can see my wood look tiles in my bathroom which are gray and it looks awesome. I would recommend getting a sample and putting it up in the basement. Since I assume there is very little natural light, the tone will largely depend on your lighting. If your flooring has a warm gray tone to it, it will probably look great. If it has a bluish cool gray tone to it, you’d have to see how it looks side by side. Hope this helps a little! Can’t believe this post is still going strong after so many years 😆

cdisimone - I have very similar color cabinets and granite in my kitchen except my backsplash is lighter and floors are very dark porcelain, wood look tile. I've been looking for a color that will work throughout the majority of my house too. After weeks of deliberating, I started with my dining room and painted Shoji White last night. Not sure I like it....it does not look warm or creamy in my house at all. It looks like a very light cool gray. :-( I was going more for a warm white so I can brighten things up but still have the warm, cozy feel. I'm going to give it a few days before continuing on through the rest of my house. My suggestion is to paint an entire wall or much larger sample on your wall before deciding!