Thanks live_wire_oak - I find myself agreeing with nearly all of your style points. I don't think we realized how prominent the roof was until we really spent some time looking at it from the street. I don't think changing the roof is in the budget now (it's pretty new), but we'll definitely keep that in mind. We're both really intrigued by the suggestion of a slab door - what is that? We picked up some paint samples yesterday. Old gutters are down and the house is already looking cleaner, even without the new ones up. We picked a gutter color that is called 'wicker', and had SW mix paint to match. Here's a pic of the samples we put up. It's dim - by the time the paint had dried, this area (east facing, under covered patio) is shaded - but you see the colors we're talking about, over the green and next to the brick. Trim/gutters - light tan (color matched wicker metal gutters) Front Door - BM Currant Red (1323) Shutters (if we do -- causing marital strife) - SW Umber Brick (more marital strife - not painting though!) - 6140 Moderate White. I like the green but we compromised and are currently planning on going with the tan color -- which we color matched from the gutter color we're putting up. That will be all the trim. The dark brown we were thinking for shutters, but if we don't do shutters... Clearly we won't use it :) Would you consider using that brown to paint the aluminum visible in the picture of the front? We'll replace the windows -- they're 1966 single pane glass -- but not sure when, and we don't like the aluminum lines.(could be usable) I like your suggestion on the planters and I'll consider today a success if I can get them dug up before the Rangers game :) Melanie, I believe, on the landscape forum, suggested creeping thyme -- I think we'll do something like that to try and break the planter box line. I also like the idea of semi-circle as landscape bed. My kids aren't playing out there - too close to the busy street - and having something to break up the monotony and add curves would be great. Melanie -- thank you for explaining! I'm looking at his books on ebay now. Thank you SO much for your help here and on the other forum! You've made us like our house a lot more. Summary on what we're going to do this week: Gutters (wicker above unless someone can talk me out of it in the next day) installed, trim/fascia/sofits painted to match. Paint front door Remove boxwood in planter boxes up front Pause and evaluate.... To sum up questions: If we don't do the shutters in Umber -- which my wife wants to do, and my painter assured her it was easy to shave the raised brick to install them, what else can we do in the brown to pop? The window frames? We had a decorator come to help with color selection, and she was a strong advocate of both shutters and painted brick. My wife is still on board with leaving the brick unpainted for now, but the shutters idea has come back with a vengeance. For what it's worth, most house in the neighborhood do ... But, this decorator also suggested we call a Realtor and ask for advice, which is exactly what I DON'T want to do. I want it to look good and not offend those that know what they're looking at! We were going to paint the windows in the white color, but would the brown pop? Give us some color without having to throw up fake shutters? VERY interested in learning more about doing a copper door. We're going to paint the door and frame in that red color above - more of a magenta. Finally, what are you guys thinking about the below picture? Dim again - my photo skills aren't the best - but this is an angle shot of my back patio. Same brick, which you can see. To the left is another bay window just like the ones out front, this one into the breakfast room/kitchen. The ceiling you'll see the drywall portion is white -- and then the wood portion turns to the trim color. The decorator we had suggested we paint the same color, the moderate white, so there's not a line -- opening the space up. But the problem is, if I paint that white, I think I have to carry the white all the way around the house under the roof, meaning the wood on the underside of the roof would be white, the rest of the trim tan. (We're thinking the white above) Or -- can I just tape off a logical line somewhere and transition from white to the trim color? Or .. I can just paint the ceiling the trim color, but then it all kinda blends in. THANK YOU!

You know what? I like the color on your front door. Keep the shutters and paint them in the same door color. That turquoise looks awesome against red brick.

Hello Houzz folks - wanted to give a quick update on our project and maybe ask for a little more advice. We put off our roofing project (yay 2020!) but are about to pick it up again. In the meantime we have made some other changes inspired in part by this very thread, so it only feels right to share! First, we painted our garage door Urbane Bronze as suggested by one of the commenters here. We LOVE what it does to ground the front facade of our ranch and it really brings up the darker brown and black in our brick. Please pardon the crappy photos (and the overgrowth!) in this picture, which was taken as the first coat of paint was drying. Looked even better after the second coat! (No idea why this picture keeps coming in sideways!) Next we tackled the front door situation. I'd always wanted a vintage solid wood MCM door to match the age of the house. A friend found a PERFECT fit at a local Restore several years ago, and I finally got around to rehabbing it. After many hours sending, several tubes of wood filler, new glass and some paint, we had a vintage deep blue 3 lite door with black hardware. I'll update with a picture of our finished product later, but the color we used was Salty Dog by Sherwin Williams, which looks absolutely beautiful against the brick and the bronze storm door. Here's the Salty Dog color: And our door is similar to this: So now we will finally get around to the roof to wrap this all up!

Our idea is to paint exterior white with dark espresso trim. The house has some original MCM features, but not much. Since we are remodeling kitchen, master bed and bath and creating an indoor outdoor feel, would like to have a cohesive plan. I feel like the exterior could lend itself well to a modern farmhouse style but it's true bones are more MCM. Thank you for any ideas and suggestions!