Moving into a Courtyard Villa & Painting the Interior
 

The trim and baseboards are white....

Have no furniture yet.

Not an expert at all in colors.

Looking for advice for colors of the walls - would like neutral colors.

Paint the bedrooms and bathroom a different color?

thank you

We had the same question about our CYV. We were going to paint the the bathroom and three bedrooms two different colors. The painter said that by doing both the BR’s and BR’s the same color, they would “flow better.” We handled it long distance and had learned from pictures and our home watch guy that the painters had painted opposite of what we asked. They painted our bedrooms and baths a neutral cream color and the living area (kitchen, DR and LR) a light mossy green. Once we learned of their error, they were then correcting it and reversing the original plan. Before repainting, we then got a call from the painters saying “the bathroom really looks good in the cream-do you want to keep it?” I kind of laughed and believed that they said that because it would makings their job easier and cheaper, but I was glad and decided to keep it and go with my original gut feeling. I like breaking it up and pulling in the bedroom green by decorating with accessories and pictures. As for the trim, we left it white and didn’t do through the added expense of painting since it was in good condition.

Most designers recommend to select paint last, after furniture, but of course it's easier to paint before moving in. Check out Sherwin Williams and Benjamin Moore websites and they have sections about 'color trends' that show popular colors and combinations. If you aren't in any hurry, get samples and paint patches on several walls in each room and see how different they look at different times of the day. Its a matter of personal preference in the long run--you like what you like. Anything is better than Brownwood Beige walls, ceilings.... Best of Luck!

I think this is just a matter of personal preference. Some people like all white/cream and I find that very sterile looking. Some like bright dark colors. Personally I like pastels because they make me feel happy. It's your house and you have to live in it do what make you like and don't worry what other people think.

In 2008 when my home in Baltimore was exactly ten years old, I repainted all 3 levels. I had originally used a light yellow. That color wore on me after awhile and didn't hold up as well. So I changed the pallet completely, going with a medium blue. With our bamboo wood floors, off white plantation shutters, and white kitchen cabinets, and with the help of some tropical artwork, when folks would visit they say, did I just go to Key West.

In April 2011 we listed the home so we could move to TV, the agent put it into the MLS system at 8pm and the next morning it was shown at 10am. The first viewer, who just happen to be the next manager at the Wegman's Grocery Store a block away, bought our home.

When we purchased our new CYV in Tamarind Grove in 2011, we hired Investment Painters over the phone from Baltimore from reading all the reviews on this site. BTW, I had a 20 page pad filled with contractors names and numbers just by using the 'search' button on this site for six months before moving here. The day after closing, Chris the owner, was at our villa with his crew of four men and I handed him the exact same paint chart I used up north. While his crew was masking and removing the blinds, he went to Sherwin Williams and picked the paint. I have to say it looks just as good as it did nine years ago. I would say think outside the box, earth tones are nice, but to me, they're boring.

Our Baltimore home.

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Our Villages villa, I only have this one photo

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I just saw a commercial for ACE hardware and they have a 'color or pint visualizer' app that allows you to see the effect of the various colors on the room, this might be helpful.

Generally it's easier to match the paint to the furniture than vice-versa. Len

I believe Sherwin Williams offers a color consultant free of charge it you purchase the paint from them. I would definitely use them if I were you. A win win! Pick out furniture first as others have suggested.

You did a beautiful job making the home yours.

The wall colors should compliment the flooring in some way. Example, if you have grey tile floors, you would not want to paint your walls in the beige/brown family. I have always had the main living room walls painted the same color, something neutral and used accent walls with a color two shades darker than the wall. Same thing if you are painting the inside of a tray ceiling. If you want bold, than make your accent wall pop by using a color that is in your pillows or a piece of furniture. Example, your accent wall could be a bright turquoise. The bedrooms, I would have fun with or make them personal. Look at a color wheel for the color first, than choose the warm family or cool family which ever goes with your furniture. Usually, if you have modern sleek furniture, you choose “cool” shades. If you have traditional furniture, you use “warm” shades. Linens and pillows can then be added to make things pop.
I have bought or built and sold 27 houses in my lifetime.... all brand new. Always sold them within days. However, with that being said, this is my first used home and the first thing I did was repaint the entire inside. Everybody has different tastes. Last, but not least, go to a paint store or Lowe’s. They sell these 12x12 squares of like poster board. Once you have chosen several colors, purchase samples of those colors. Take them home and paint one half of the square. Tape it to the all the walls in the room you want to paint because the amount of light coming in to the room can change a color instantly. Look at it with blinds closed and then open to get an idea of what the color will be like in your home. Final thought, if crown moulding is in your budget, go for it!!! It makes all wall colors really pop instead of fading away in to the ceiling! Have fun!

Go to Sherwin Williams. Grab some neutral color samples and paint them on the walls. They employees are very helpful. I think it best to paint the entire space one color, then accent it with furniture and accessories.

Sherwin Williams has a color consultant who will come to your house and assist you in choosing colors.

Paint
 

Agree with Marcy. Paint it a neutral color, maybe in the grey or taupe family. Use the same color throughout the house. Sherwin Williams is very helpful.

I painted the entire villa the same color before moving in. Very pale gray or taupe. I chose gray. Then moved in. A little color on the wall is better than the contractors watered down paint. Live in your place for several months to get a feel For what you would like.

Colors are very personal, if you have no preference you should just paint everything cream or white. Most people pick out colors like they pick out clothes. Some of my colors which I have already changed after 12 years, are now completely different. Some colors can only be picked if you have furniture in place. Find a consultant if you want professional opinions.

Neutral colors are boring or for houses on the market. Make you home your own. My great room is raspberry red, looks great with my gunstock oak floors and burgandy Persian rugs. Dont be afraid of color, it makes life interesting. Be yourself, don't follow the crowd

Sherwin Williams Big Chill is a very neutral gray with no brown undertones, looks beautiful on the walls, light and airy.

Benjamin Moore Glass slipper color. Did entire house and each room with different lighting made it different in each room. Glass Slipper is great with white baseboards. Good Luck.

IMHO, it certainly makes sense to coordinate wall colors with your floors and furniture. But if you have large windows and have a "view", then my preference is to be sure that the interior walls don't clash with the colors in your "view".

Can’t go wrong with gray’s. We did two shades that had a greenish tint... very happy. sherwin Williams Sedate gray and Chatroom.... and woodwork is white

If there’s any chance you may want to sell it (most do not stay in their original villages home), stay with a neutral color. Gray is the popular color right now and easy to decorate around and feels very cool and serene. You can choose a couple shades off the same color chart but don’t mix and match your colors.

Sherwin Williams app. called ColorSnap. I took a picture of the colors in my decorating and matched to their colors available.
It’s quite useful.
Several choices in the app.
You need a smart phone though.

Schedule a decorator from Sherwin Williams paint store for a minimum charge. We have used them twice. Were very helpful. They come to your home for an hour and discuss your preferences, furniture, and flooring and offer suggestions. Great process.

I love that blue paint color! Do you mind sharing what paint that is?

Painting all the rooms in a neutral color I like a light grey especially a courtyard villa or patio villa will make the home look larger and not chopped up, bring your color in with the comforter, pillows, and artwork

Be careful of creams yellows or paints with yellow under tones it tends to get very yellow in the bright Florida sunshine.

SW does offer consultant advice. We used it and had a consultant came to our house. She was excellent!

It cost $95 for the home visit and we received a $50 SW gift card. Then we got bids from painters and specified they use SW paint. When we chose the painter, we simply gave him the gift card and he reduced his quote by $50.

Net cost for SW consultant was $45.

I have a courtyard villa and left it white throughout for 3 years until I decided what I wanted to do. I found it cold and impersonal and definitely not me. I finally painted all the rooms And hallways , except the bedrooms a pale blue lighter than the sky. It suddenly became mine and everyone who walks in comments how beautiful the color is. However, I left the bedrooms/ bathrooms the neutral white, so I can change the bedspreads , curtains , etc to whatever color I want. Holiday/ seasonal spreads and shower curtains look great as a result! You should decorate in your own taste but if you have it in mind to eventually move, I would definitely keep it neutral( grey or beige) and not any bright color. If you do this though you may never feel it’s your own.

I looked at hundred of homes in The Villages over many months on Zillow before I found what I wanted and bought it (furniture included). One thing I noticed was that there were a lot of houses with a white or light cream color that were just fine. No trouble. Often they really lightened up the rooms. There were some with rooms in dark colors that looked very nice, such as hunter green or a deep rose. I would have happily moved in without repainting. Then there were houses with rooms with dark colors or pastels that I couldn’t stand. For example, anything purple is unbearable, or a bright green, or a pastel green or blue. Horrors! I didn’t necessarily cross those houses off the list, but I knew that if I bought them I’d have to repaint. So much easier to not repaint. So I would say that it’s good to consider how long you plan to keep the house. If it’s just for five years, say, that special color may prevent a sale, though it might also lead to one.

I agree with those who say get the biggest paint sample you can and try it in different lights. If you are basing it all on, say, professional photos on Zillow or other sites, bear in mind that those photos are taken with extra lighting, and what you will see in person will be much darker. (Also, they are taken with the equivalent of 24 mm very wide angle lenses that make the rooms look MUCH bigger than they really are—or is that bedroom door actually four feet wide?)

I had a girlfriend with a good eye for paint colors, and ten years ago I asked her to choose colors for my bedrooms. I took all of her suggestions because they looked really nice. Thus, one was two colors of dark green, and one was two shades of sort of chocolate milk color. The third was a dark rose and a darker one. I ended up repainting the first two immediately, before I’d even finished. They were nice colors, but the rooms were too dark. So one I painted Irish linen with white trim, and the other I painted a very cheerful yellow, which looks great. I tried the same yellow in the kitchen, but hated it. I ended up with two tones of avocado to go with the solid natural cherry cupboards. Then next to that, a small wall of hunter green mixed with sand. It’s very hard to know.

May I mention that while the very classy furniture in my new house was a major selling point (tan leather, rough chiseled marble and glass, and all the wood pickled), there was a lot of expensive furniture in homes for sale that I couldn’t stand. There was a lot of imitation dark wood and glass China cabinets that I couldn’t stand. People like what people like, but a lot of that expensive Ethan Allen and Raymour and Flanagan stuff does not appeal to everyone. Takes all sorts. Most of the artwork was even more of a turn-off. Not necessarily cheap, but imitation art painted in China a dozen at a time. If you love art museums, you can’t bear that sort of thing.

We have never repainted ours but our baseboards are white but appliances are beige and the walls are all beige of all the rooms. Since we tend to be conservative we like this. The ceramic tile is beige and white.

We recently had Investment Painters apply a sealer to our new Pergola, it's a difficult job because of cut-in's and thinness of stain they did an excellent job. Highly recommend them.

I just visited a friend's courtyard Villa and she had completely redone the interior and it looked fabulous. She had all the walls painted Sherwin-Williams paint color rhinestone which is categorized as a white but has a definite Gray tint to it so it looks like a very light grey. My sister had her walls painted agreeable gray by Sherwin-Williams also and that was very nice neutral color. It's better to have the whole house done in neutral colors and then put your color in each room with your accessories and furniture. That makes it much easier to change colors when you need a change.

There are a lot of variables when it comes to paint colors. The same color can look very different in different houses or rooms. Depends a lot on which direction the light is coming from and the size of the rooms. ie - light coming in from the north will make a paint color look very different from a room with a southern exposure. It can get very confusing with all the tans, grays and other neutral colors available. Best to hire a decorator if your serious about the colors on your walls.

I have a lot of artwork and colorful furnishings (red loveseat!) so I always have off white walls so they don't clash with any of my decor. But grey tones are definitely what's in fashion these days if you want to be hip.

Me too. My main living area will need repainted but I'd like an up-dated blue shade. This one looks closer to what I want .

I think if you have a smaller home, one color throughout creates an impression of roominess and flows better. You can always “make it your own” with your wall art, pillows, furniture choices.

we have the Woodlawn CYV. pastel yellow on all walls except salmon accent wall on the kitchen/dining pass thru.

Choosing paint colors
 

If you go to Sherwin Williams they can schedule a color consultant to come to your house and help you out. There is a charge , however they give you a gift card to use to buy paint.

The original paint from Baltimore photo below is Home Depot Behr Paint #500E-2 Aqua Breeze. The bottom photo from our villa was painted by Investment Painters using Sherwin Williams, and he took the paint chart and just matched with a color that SW had, I don't know which one exactly.

It's more blue on the wall than the Behr website shows.

Aqua Breeze500E-2 | Behr Paint Colors

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We have a Woodlawn CYV below, which are now known as a Durham and is painted with one color throughout by Investment Painters.

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Do what makes you feel good. What colors calm you or compliment your furniture. Sometimes just an accent wall. Our house is still basic “villages neutral” but we did paint guest bathroom pale yellow and den (second guest room) light blue.