The deed is done. Behold, our freshly painted foyer:
It feels about a foot taller and at least two feet wider than it did before. Ah, the power of paint.
This shot’s probably the most accurate when it comes to color. It’s definitely one of those soft neutrals that shifts throughout the day, but I’d say it’s one part sand and one part greige. Not too cool and not too warm. And pretty darn beautiful with white trim.
As for choosing the color, we mentioned a bunch of swatches we were loving in this post, and shared this little makeshift palette:
Can you guess who ended up in the foyer?
Good ol’ Edgecomb Gray. The funny part about that swatch is it’s not really gray (it’s warmer, more like a greige). Another pretty hilarious thing about it is that it looked terrible in our last house, but here it’s gorgeous (it’s crazy how differently a swatch can read depending on the lighting situation, what direction your room faces, etc). So in a sea of paint chips it was an easy choice. Which is nice because it’s a pretty big commitment.
The foyer leads to four downstairs rooms as well as flowing up the stairs and into the hallway up there which leads to six additional rooms – so we knew that whatever we chose would have to work well with any other wall colors we’d be choosing for all ten of those spaces that will connect to it.
As for getting it up on the walls, first we filled in a few nail holes with spackle and then primed those spots as well as any areas that had raw drywall (from our wallpaper peeling adventures).
Then it was painting time. It thankfully only took two coats (as opposed to the trim, which took four). We went with an eggshell finish in BM’s no-VOC Natura stuff, so John got his roll on and I cut in – yes, around chair rail, crown molding, baseboards, and seven (!!) doorways.
As you can imagine it took John about one tenth of the time to roll that it took me to cut in around all of those edges, but it was totally worth it. I love the new wall color so much that I could do a musical number about it. (Seriously, don’t tempt me – I’m a terrible dancer).
It’s one of those colors that changes throughout the day and feels so airy and breezy, like the sky at the beach. Some moments it’s like the lightest part of a platinum cloud, and other moments it’s warmer and richer – like coffee with lots of milk swirling around in there.
We have a devoted post all about this paint color if you want to see more photos of Edgecomb Gray in our house & read why we love it so much. Oh and after our paint job, we switched out the old yellowed outlets and switches for crisp new white ones. Such a cheap fix, but just like fresh paint, they go a long way in making the room feel updated.
Can’t wait to get some art going on. Oh yeah and paint the other fifteen rooms in our house (note to self: don’t think about that, just focus on your musical number).
It’s nice to have a pop of color in the door since all of the white trim and doors around it seem to temper it while the neutral walls and the dark floors and door hardware ground things. And you know the light fixture is on my ORB list.
I like this shot because the blue spindles leading up the stairs almost look black instead of periwinkle blue. Although I think we’re leaning towards white for those spindles (when we can work up the energy to do four coats on them) and eventually we’d love to ebonize the top part of the railing to go with the dark door hardware everywhere. Sort of like this or this.
In the meantime we’re just soaking up the victory of completing a whole lotta trim, doors, chair rail, crown, and getting some fresh paint on the walls in there.
Change is good.
Anna says
What a difference! Sounds like it was a LOT of work, but what a beautiful payoff! Why did it take four coats of paint on the trim? Did you not use a primer first? Or did it take a coat of primer plus three coats of paint?
YoungHouseLove says
We used two coats of primer and two coats of paint. The blue was just showing through a ton!
xo
s
Shona says
Such a nice, sophisticated color! I have that paint chip in my collection and never understood the “gray” part either and perhaps for that reason, I have never been very drawn to it. If you don’t mind my asking, what direction does your house face? Ours faces NW and the foyer is always a little dim. I’m just wondering if this color would ever work in our house.
YoungHouseLove says
Our house faces west I think. Hope it helps!
xo
s
Celia says
Wow, what a beautiful transformation. Love the door color with the new wall color and trim. Awesome choices.
Kayla says
Oh man, the former owners of this house must have just LOVED that blue color. I can’t imagine voluntarily taking the time to paint all the trim and stair rails that color. Ugh.
Carol says
That blue trim was really “in” 20 years ago. Makes me wonder want the “in” thing is today and how we will look back in 20 years an wonder what we were thinking :-)
Lisa E says
Well said Carol! It might come back to being sacrireligious (sp?) to paint trim!
Steph Nelson says
I am itching to paint my house and this just makes it worse! :) Looks great guys! Why does Burger look like he is guilty of something?
YoungHouseLove says
Haha, that’s his default look.
xo
s
Stephanie says
I just did my kitchen/fam room/foyer in Behr’s Sandstone Cove. It’s almost identical to Edgecomb Grey and I just love it. Perfect neutral. I did the kitchen and bathroom of our first house in the same color, and couldn’t wait to use it again in our current home. I’m thinking about Revere Pewter (the color adjacent to Edgecomb Grey on the swatch) for our dining room.
Oh, and I’m using Ben Moore’s Advance paint for my kitchen cabinets right now, per your recommendation. It is truly great quality paint, some of the best I have ever worked with. Thanks for the tip! Color is BM’s Iron Gate on the bottoms, and probably going to have them match Behr’s White Truffle for the uppers.
Keep up the good work, your blog is a treat to read and a wealth of good information for us DIYers!
YoungHouseLove says
So glad! That Advance stuff is the best, right?
xo
s
Sarah C says
We have Edgecomb Gray and Revere Pewter right next to each other and they look great together. :D I say go for it!
Sara says
LOVE IT! Looks beautiful
Lucy says
Edgecombe Gray is the go to paint color in our house! We have an open floor plan in the downstairs that leads up the stairs and into the second floor hallway without a break, so this is the right mix of neutral with character. Just had to give our fave color a shout out! Nice choice, and things are really coming along :-)
Sarah M. Dorsey says
It’s amazing what paint can do! Looks amazing!!
Amy @ a new old house says
What a huge difference! Looks great!
Lisa J says
Your house looks beautiful! We have edgecomb gray all through our current house. It has a ton of natural wood including an exposed, vaulted, knotty pine ceiling and wood tone window frames and since we decided to work with the wood tone instead of paint it, we chose this color to compliment it. Our house also has a lot of natural light with lots of windows and skylights and the color looks amazing and changes from a creamy soft tan during the day to a light gray at night. LOVE IT!
Lisa E says
This is totally off topic (I’ve already commented about your wonderfully newly painted foyer), but thought you and your readers would like to know of deceptive pricing over at Rugs USA. Check out this blog’s post: http://www.beaninloveblog.com/2013/07/trouble-underfoot.html?showComment=1375112242738#c5459134590842381190
YoungHouseLove says
No way! So good to know Lisa. Thanks for sharing!
xo
s
Lisa E says
My pleasure! :)
Megan @ The Brick Bungalow says
I love a good neutral paint! That color is very similar (at least on my monitor) to my bedroom and living room color – Monroe Bisque, although I think MB is more on the tannish/yellow side than gray. Either way, it does the same thing and changes throughout the day. I love that about paint! And speaking of paint, I’m in the thick of it while painting my daughter’s room and soon to be son’s room eventually. It’s so fun to see a room change with such a simple (although sometimes tedious task… like cutting in!) task as painting. Good luck with the rest of paint choices and decorating. I love the idea of ORBing the light fixture, I can totally picture that in my head!
Lauren says
It looks amazing! I’m in the midst of repainting crown and base moldings. It’s only 2 rooms and only 2 coats but man is it hard!! I don’t know how you do/did it!! The stress of not getting paint on the ceiling/walls/floor is killing me and its taking days upon days to get it done :(
Stephanie says
Sherri, yes, Advance is totally the way to go! I’m also in the process of using it to resurrect an antique Skandia Furniture sideboard I trash-picked a couple weeks ago. It’s gonna be fab!
Deana says
I feel really dumb giving pros any painting tips. I just finished painting my entire house. The best paint cup I found was the Handy Paint Pail at HD. Grasping a regular paint cup handle for hours made my fingers hurt. The paint pail has a strap so your hand just rests securely next to the cup. Of course, I’m older than you guys and naturally have more aches and pains. Ha!
YoungHouseLove says
Love the tip!
xo
s
Krys says
This is so gorgeous! Dont hate me for saying that the light fixture almost looks ok now! I wasnt too sure about the blue door for inside but that also looks great with the walls and the ceilings look painted as well! One question: This seems like a lot of work for a temporary fix so Is this a permanent fix or one of the “in the mean time” smaller changes until you make a long term decision like the half bath?
YoungHouseLove says
This is definitely a long-haul change (if we can’t repair the cracked tile we’ll have to fix that eventually, and we might add wainscoting and paint under the chair rail white in a few years, but other than that this room will is inching towards done, so it’s not a Phase 1 change or anything like that. Those usually occur in bathrooms and kitchens since they’re a lot more to renovate (so we have to save up).
xo
s
Shelly says
My husband and I just bought our 3rd fixer upper. We are planning on painting all the wood trim white. I noticed you didn’t use the sprayer for the trim downstairs. Is that because of the floor? We are planning on spraying all of our trim and keeping all the flooring (hardwoods and carpet). Do you have any recommendations of how we should go about keeping it from getting on the flooring? Also, how many times do you think we need to spray? The wood trim is medium-dark wood and high gloss.
By the way, I LOVE your house! It’s given me encouragement and excitement to start in with our new house! :)
YoungHouseLove says
Yes, we thought about spraying the foyer trim, but since it connects to 4 rooms and has two closets and a front door that was a ton of doorways/openings to tape off and we thought it would take us forever so we opted to paint by hand (which also took forever, haha!). I think a coat of primer and a coat of paint (or two) would do it with a sprayer since it goes on thicker, at least ours does. Good luck!
xo
s
Kristi@chatfield court says
Great color!! Isn’t it the worst cutting in with so many doors and trim? We had a house like that and I was always the one with the job cutting in. How does that happen? LOL
Lesley says
THAT’S IT!!! I have been searching for the wall colour match for “little boy finger grime”… please do not take offence. I have a 9.5 year old that seems to NEED to walk down the hall and stairway with his hands reached to either side, even does a little foots up swing at the top of the stairs before he dismounts! Such a proud mom :O
Anyway since I think sand is part of what makes his hands leave a trail of the colour, this could totally work!
I would have guessed that it was the slightly lighter Sea Wind. Since our stairs and hall are central to the house with no windows for it’s own natural light, do you think that would be safer? Or this whole ‘half tint’ concept you have mentioned of the Edgecomb Gray? Or are they totally different colours and I can’t tell?
Our kitchen, which you can see at the same time as the hall, but is not connected to it, is Weimaraner, so the tone should probably be similar.
YoungHouseLove says
I would bring home a swatch of both Sea Wind and Edgecomb Gray and see how they read. A half-tint always works for lightening something too! Hope it helps!
xo
s
Megan says
I painted our basement Edgecombe gray years ago. Lots and lots of paneling to cover but really liked it. Then, I painted our bedroom it and didn’t like it at all! Proves you really should test your colors everywhere.
Gwen says
Wow! GREAT JOB!!
Jenny@EvolutionofStyle says
Oh how I love (and never tired of) the power of paint! It looks fantastic – so fresh and airy! Love it! I hear you on the wallpaper removal – my husband’s office was a nightmare. I think re-drywalling would have been easier!
Rhonda says
What color did you use for your trim? I’m about to repaint a lot of green trim (as opposed to your blue) and I’m shopping colors.
YoungHouseLove says
BM’s Simply White.
xo
s
Jennifer says
You’ve inspired me to add some color to the house! Six weeks of sitting on the couch in injury recovery gave me a lot of time to plan, and the plans include a lot more than just white and beige now!
Jenny says
Love the new foyer look. We have old paint on our walls in the bathroom. It is peeling off. The drywall is showing in spots. Any tutorials on peeling wall paint and how to repaint the room? Will primer cover the peeling parts?
Thank you.
YoungHouseLove says
Generally you want to smooth things before paint and primer or the cracks/peeling will show through, so maybe sand it smooth first? Be sure it’s not lead paint though!
xo
s
Jenny says
It looks so great! I’ll keep that wall color in mind. I can vouch for how awesome both white-waiscotting lower walls look and two-tone walls — we have both in our kitchen and dining room, respectively, and both look great in our space (a somewhat-similar center hall colonial).
Every time I see a picture with your lovely new door hardware (which is a lot, given your painting work recently) I’m tempted to replace ours. The house is full of quirky old, mismatched doorknobs original to the 1930’s build. I’m torn between loving the quirkiness and authentic feeling it gives, and thinking the spaces would look more polished and cared-for with more matching hardware. Especially the bedroom hallway, which is only about 4 ft by 8 ft but has three bedrooms, a bath and a closet on it, each with their own combination of doorknobs. Any advice??
YoungHouseLove says
I think that’s a toughie! I know lots of folks who would love 30’s hardware even if it’s mismatched (sounds charming to me!) but if it’s damaged or painted over and you can’t seem to salvage it or it doesn’t function as well as you’d like, I could definitely see replacing it. And then maybe craigslisting or ebaying the old hardware to get some money back (and pass it along to someone else who’d use it happily!).
xo
s
Jenny says
Thanks for the thoughts!
Mia B says
We are foyer twinsies! Well, sort of. Yours looks great with the new paint and reminds me so much of ours, in our circa 1975 house neo-Colonial. We have a red brick floor instead of the slate, but we painted the walls Sherwin Williams Relaxed Khaki which looks very similar. Our stairwell makes a 90 turn at a landing and has two more steps down into the foyer, so we decided to run the same foyer color up the stairwell (once you get into the stairwell, it’s two story ceiling height and it was hard enough to paint the walls on a tall ladder that I couldn’t figure the cutting in with a different color – we used the “paint brush taped to a pole” method and stood at the top of our tallest ladder – tricky in a stair situation, I couldn’t even watch my husband at some times because I felt like we were auditioning for “Jacka$$”) and into the upstairs hall. It was all kind of contiguous spaces, so we elected to paint the ceiling the same color as the walls, as it was kind of funky how the previous owners had chosen which walls belonged to foyer and which belonged to stairwell and painted them in different schemes. We could tell that was no bueno, so went with one overall color, and since it’s so neutral, the upstairs hall which opens onto five beds and a bathroom still lets us make different choices for those rooms but still flow.
Upstairs hall gets light only from the bedrooms to either side, so the paint definitely looks a shade darker up there, especially on the ceiling (like, “are you sure you are using the same paint can? This looks way different! Are you sure? SURE?”). I’m going to get a few Solatubes installed to lighten things up (and because I’m a sunshine addict).
We had a kitchen tile floor and we had Stanley Steemers steam clean the grout, and it still didn’t look great (clean but kind of blotchy), but then they offered to put on a grout “colorant” and painted it on with a paintbrush and it looked brand new after that – we chose a dark gray. There is likely a DIY version but I don’t know if it will be as durable. We tried a DIY white grout restoring product in our white tile bathroom and it came up nearly immediately, but the gray pro job is still going strong a year later. Probably has to do with the wider width of the grout joint and sanded grout in the kitchen, vs. narrow, unsanded grout lines in the bath.
Oh, we have almost the same foyer light, but ours is kind of patina-ed a rubbed bronze already. I was ready to ditch it entirely until a friend sent me a picture of Restoration Hardware’s $1300 version and now it’s growing on me. Ours has starburst “70s” glass that I want to change/obscure/frost?
http://www.restorationhardware.com/catalog/product/product.jsp?productId=prod1619194&categoryId=cat1701013
Good luck as you continue on your reno!
YoungHouseLove says
Woah! That’s an expensive light fixture. I’d love to see photos of yours after you frost/change it!
xo
s
Lauren says
Drop.dead.gorgeous! I love it! This is actually the color I used in my family room and perhaps my favorite of all the colors in my house! It looks awesome in your space and with that front door!
Have you guys done a post on how to replace outlets or switches? If not, I’d love a tutorial on that as I have many yellowed outlets in my house that need some attention.
YoungHouseLove says
I don’t think we have (it’s hard to take photos when the power is off and it’s dark in a room, haha!) but I bet on youtube.com you could find a really helpful video!
xo
s
Ashley says
Hi Sherry! Looks fantastic!! I’m just curious because I was inspired by you and started painting our bathroom trim. Well, the thing is, I left it on the wall just like you and it was like IMPOSSIBLE to not get some on the floor. I just couldn’t get a perfect line on the bottom of the trim that meets the floor. Do you have this problem too??
Thanks for the input!
YoungHouseLove says
I think after years of painting I have a pretty steady hand, but sometimes I use green frog tape to tape off the floor and then I can get a nice clean line.
xo
s
Shannon says
It looks AWESOME. Seriously, every new paint color you guys introduce makes me drool. I think I need a 100-room house so I can use all of them!
Cindy says
I can’t wait for ya’ll to paint the stair banisters. It is a project that needs to be done in my home, but it totally intimidates me. The only difference is ours has the rod-iron spindles that are beautiful and will stay black, but the handrail and the wood that goes up the wall between each stair is an ugly orange oak color. I don’t know if I should paint them white or black. Do you think it would be too much black since the spindles are already black. Should I do a combo of white and black (black handrail, with white wood up the wall)? The walls are grey and the front door is black with white trim.
YoungHouseLove says
Someone in the comments linked to stairs with black spindles and a black handrail and they’re so pretty! Hope it helps!
xo
s
Kate says
We (and by we, I mean my husband) just painted our bathroom this color this past weekend! We had picked the color several months ago and finally had the time to do it. We were excited to see the color pop up in your new house palette (“See! This must be a good color- younghouselove says so!”)
Kathy says
Gorgeous!!
I have two Qs: I’m about to go buy paint today at the BMoore store, and I’m wondering if you used the same color on your ceiling here? And do you think that using a paint specifically for ceilings is always necessary? Thank you!
YoungHouseLove says
We just use any old flat paint for ceilings and it’s great. As for the color, we haven’t painted ours yet but it’s on the list!
xo
s
Amanda S. says
Oh my gosh, it looks SO good with the floor, the door color and the oil rubbed bronze hardware!!! It all just FITS together!
Karla says
What color did you paint the ceiling?
YoungHouseLove says
We haven’t tackled that yet, but we’re still deciding between a few options. Will keep you posted!
xo
s
Kate D says
We just painted our bathroom this color over the weekend! We had picked the color a few months ago, but just finally had time to get around to it. We were excited to see this color show up in your new house palette “See!! Younghouselove approved! It must be a good color.”
Heather says
I love it. I’m such a sucker for soft beige walls and bright white trim. MUCH improved!
Tirzah says
Looks fabulous! I was wondering how tall your ceilings are. I was envisioning a new entry light fixture for you, but the options are limited by ceiling height.
I want to get a chandelier to put over the master bed, but we have 8 foot ceilings and kids that occasionally jump on the bed. Options are few!
YoungHouseLove says
Our ceilings are 8″ (standard height).
xo
s
Renee says
Those spindles would look amazing in black! It would fit right in with the tan, blue, and white.
Bonnie says
I really love it, guys. It’s very simple. This is weird but it reminds me of the color of a mourning dove kinda.
Julia says
WOW! That looks amazing. What boggles my mind the most is how much different the slate looks just because of the paint changes.
I can’t wait until you guys paint the stairwell. I have a stairwell waiting to be painted and I am eager to hear your tips about how to do it best. It’s kind of a daunting project to me.
Lisa says
I just selected Edgecomb gray as a suggestion (and free can) from a friend. We used it in our basement with darker carpet and white trim. It is a lovely color in a tricky space. It is a fabulous color!
Mellissa says
Wowee, what a difference!
Looks great!
Sarah C says
We just painted most of our townhouse Edgecomb Gray and I LOVE it!!! When I saw your palette a coupla weeks ago I was SO pumped EG was on it! (I felt so validated. lol):D It doesn’t read gray in our house either. But it definitely looks fresh and upscale. While researching colors I read where a designer said, “I’ve seen it go beige and I have seen it go gray but I have never seen it go yellow.” I was fine with it going gray or beige so I pulled the trigger! (It’s also a favorite of Candice Olsen, who I adore.) I think your foyer looks fantastic!
Rachel says
It looks beautiful! Great choice.
Claudia says
LOVE that color!!! We need to paint the exterior of our house soon and I’ve been looking at warm greiges like that one. Any ideas for a good color palette to go with w bright orange roof? I’d love a turquoise door but I don’t think I can.
YoungHouseLove says
Hmm, I would bring home a bunch of swatches to see what look best! Lighting really changes things a lot, so what looks nice to us in our area/lighting might not work for your house.
xo
s
Ali Burtt says
That fresh coat of paint is amazing! That space looks so freaking different–it look HUGE! I love it. Are you totally impatient to do the railings and do something about that lantern-like fixture?
YoungHouseLove says
I feel like a go back and forth between totally impatient to do one thing and totally impatient to do another thing. Haha! So things keep jockeying for the top of the to-do list!
xo
s
Karen says
Ok, I had to go back and look at the paint job again. And seriously, if this whole blog thing doesn’t work out for you guys (ha!) you could always start your own painting biz-ness! It really looks like you hired professionals to do it! Oh. Wait. You guys ARE pretty much professionals at this point. :-D
Natalie says
Love how you’re transforming your house :) I had a question though – why not paint the spindles blue to tie in with the front door? Maybe go a touch greyer/lighter? With all those neutrals it seems like it would be a fun touch of color :)
YoungHouseLove says
I think we like the door being the star, so we don’t want other things in other areas to pull attention, so that’s why we’re leaning towards white spindles.
xo
s