Your Living Room in Color

Besides your kitchen, your living room is the most used room in your room when it comes to entertaining guests.  You want your guests to be amazed at your home décor.  The living room is the hardest room in your home to decorate because it needs to be not only versatile but entertaining and comfortable as well.  You want your living room to be the center of your castle for your friends, family and neighbors to see.  So the colors and designs that you choose for your living room will set the mood of your entire home.  It is important to take note that there are some colors that have a positive effect on people whereas other colors will make people feel gloomy.  Yellow is a color that brightens peoples day where gray is a dreary color.  

Before you begin your living room decorating, you need to decide what kind of mood you are looking for.  Do you want your living room to be a peaceful area or do you want a party atmosphere?  The answer will greatly determine what look you need to go with.  

The most popular color in home decorating is blue.  Blue shows off a sense of calm as it is associated with the ocean.  The color blue can make a small room look larger and it stimulates elated emotional responses.  The blue gray tone is a popular shade to use in the living room.  Green is also a popular color because it represents nature and is associated with trees and plants.  Using green is a more exciting color than blue but it still produces a sense of mental calm.  The color green is easy on the eye and a great idea if you want to create a calming room.  If you aren’t much of an ocean or nature person, try using earth tones.  These earth tones are in the brown family such as brown or tan and are more of a rustic nature.  Earth colors give off a feeling of closeness and warmth.  For an added touch, add the color green to really bring you to the outdoors.  Reds and yellows are two colors you may want to avoid in the living room.  Red is an aggressive color and yellow can cause eye irritation and uncomfortable.  If you really have your heart set on yellow or red, try a soft muted yellow or a maroon color.  Pink is not the greatest color for a living room because it is more of a feminine color that should be used in a little girls’ room.  

Using any of these tips listed above will make your living room the best room in your home.

Warm Colors for Your Home

Warm colors are warm and vibrant.  In this article we will look at some of the more popular warm colors and how you can incorporate them into your color scheme.

Apricot- Apricot is a color that is somewhere in between orange and pink.  It has a touch of tawny-gold.  Apricot is a funny color to work with.  If you are using the color to paint your walls, you have two choices really.  You can ask the paint store where you buy your paint to mix in cream or off-white paint to the apricot so it is not so strong.  Or you can paint your walls in full blown apricot and then offset the color by adding neutral colors such as cream colored throw pillows to your couch or off-white sheets on your bed.  Apricot is best used on the side of your home where it gets the least sun because the color will add warmth.  You can also use little touches of apricot throughout the room by adding an apricot slipcover on a chair, some apricot throw pillows on a cream colored couch or a rug with apricot tones.

Pale Pink- This is one of my favorite colors and the color I chose when decorating my bathroom.  Of course I live with my husband and teenage son who don’t really like the pink bathroom.  Every woman can remember back to her childhood and wearing pretty pink dresses and dressing her Barbie in pale pink.  Pale pink works very well in a room that is mainly decorated in deeper colors such as dark green or deep blue.  You can also use pale pink to warm up an off-white or cream color.  

Salmon- Many people think of a fish and not a color when they hear the word salmon.  Well yes, salmon is a fish but it is also silky pink color that is used in decorating.  Many people don’t think of the color salmon as pink but it is part of the pink family.  Salmon works well in any room of your home and can be used to paint entire walls with.  If you are looking for an old-fashioned look, try painting the walls of a study, living room or bedroom in salmon then painting all the trimming in cream colored.  Add dark salmon curtains for a complete look.  

Lemon Yellow- There is nothing better on a hot summer day that an iced cold glass of fresh squeezed lemonade.  Lemon yellow can be used to brighten up any room in your home.  If you have a room in your home that has the sun shining in it most of the day, then lemon yellow can enhance the natural sunlight.  If you have a room in your home that has less sun, then lemon yellow can bring brightness to that room.  A perfect combination would be lemon yellow walls and deep green trim.  This is the ideal nature combination.  

Any room in your home can be refreshed with these colors.

Using Psychology to Decorate Your Bedroom

When sitting in a room that you want to decorate, thinking of which colors you want, close your eyes and feel the emotions that are going on in your head.  The colors that you choose in that room and throughout you home can have a lasting impression on your psyche.  Understanding how color work on your emotions will help you have a greater understanding of what colors you want in your home.  While psychology studies have shown that there is no universal feeling evoked from any color in all people across the world but they have found that within certain societies there are general trends in different people.  It seems that the same color can have a different effect on people from one country to another.  For example, the color red in the United States means aggression where in China is represents calmness.  

So you may think that you are not sure which colors to choose since each color affects every person different.  But have no fear since there are general trends in psychological studies within the United States that affect all persons.  So in order to choose the colors that are right for your mood, you also have to take into consideration the emotions and feelings of everyone else who lives in the home.  Except for your bedroom, which is where YOU get to choose the colors because that is where you spend your time more than anyone else in the house, the other rooms in the home are used and occupied by everyone in the household.  

The two colors that are the most extreme are black and white.  These two colors are total opposites.  Black is an attention grabber.  It creates a dark, sultry ambience.  It is important to note that if you use too much black in any room in your home it will make that room look smaller than it actually is.  The color black has also been known to cause more nightmares in people.  But the color white has its problems too.  Many people use the color white for the walls in their home.  The color can have a soothing effect on people.  But white can also lead to a lack of stimulation.  So because of this white is not a good color for a bedroom.  

Earth tones are another popular color for many people.  These colors are gentle and bring a cozy feeling to any room.  Earth tone colors include brown, orange, greens and yellows.  Brown brings families closer together, orange is a happy color and yellow has a positive effect on people.  

Blues and greens bring peace and serenity to most people.  It reminds many people of nature, the sky and crystal clear water.  Using blues and greens in your bedroom can bring calmness among its occupants and that makes for better sleep.  The color bleu also reduces nighttime cravings.  

Red is a color that dispenses excitement.  If you are a person that suffers from insomnia then red is not a color that you want to use in the bedroom.  Red also makes people more aggressive.  It speeds up people metabolism and gives them more energy.

Tones and shades are important to take note of as they will alter these effects somewhat.  It is the effects on your own mind that are most important, and only you can truly understand your own impressions. 

Teen Themed Bedrooms

Teens have some wild tastes and personalities.  They like everything from retro to video games to martial arts to the beach.  So why not create a themed bedroom your teen will love.

Video Game Theme- This is more of a theme for guys rather than girls although there are some teen girls into video games.   A state of the art video game bedroom would include a flat screen TV on the wall with an entertainment system that of course features a game console.  

Retro Theme- Retro is a theme that is popular among teens these days.  Retro goes back to the culture, music, clothes and hair style of the 1960’s and 1970’s.  When designing a room in this theme, use bright colors such as red, orange and yellow.  Also tie dye and shag carpets were popular in the retro era.  

Family and Friends Theme- This is more of a popular room for girls.  Add photos of friends and family to one wall in the room.  You can add vacation photos, prom pics, graduation, homecoming and wedding that you attended.  

Mixed Martial Arts- This is the perfect theme for a boy’s room.  Pin up posters of your favorite martial artist.  For an added touch, you can add sparring gloves or hang a punching bag in the room so you can work out in your own bedroom.

Outdoors Theme- For the teen who just can’t get enough of the outside, an outdoors theme is the perfect color scheme.  Use wallpaper and/or borders to reflect your favorite outdoor scenes.  You can choose themes from mountain climbing, underwater exploration, wooded scenes and seashore scenes.  Using earth colors such as brown and green will help make the theme more complete.  

Beach/Surfer Theme- Teens who love the beach in the summer or who can’t stay off the surf board need to have a beach theme.  But you don’t just want to hang posters of your favorite surfer or pictures of the beach.  You want a tropical theme going on such as palm trees and bamboo mats or hang a couple of surfboards as wall decorations.  

City Theme- If you are into big cities such as New York Coty, Paris, London or France, then you need to have a big city theme bedroom.  Decorate the room with souvenirs from the big cities or paint a mural of your favorite city skyline.  If you want a more of a city feel, try a loft bed.

Travel Theme- If you dream of traveling or living in another country, then a travel theme is the perfect bedroom theme.  Fill your room with globes, maps, travel posters, photos and souvenirs.  

So if you are feeling adventurous, then try one or more of these themes.