Benefits of Painted Kitchens by Andy Barette, Creative Services Director
Painted kitchens; there are numerous benefits to having a painted kitchen and generally you are not restricted to colour choice as you would be with say a laminated door kitchen whereby you may only have a limited number of finishes to choose from. This means you can select from your favourite paint collection, be it Farrow and Ball, Little Greene, Paint and Paper Library etc. When considering your colour choice for a painted kitchen, its relationship with the floor and worktops are important. It’s also necessary to consider how the chosen colour will look at different times of the day and how it reacts to shade and natural/ artificial light. It’s often the case that to achieve the colour that someone has in their minds eye, a different shade needs to be selected to get the result they require in their own home. Make sure you take proper painted samples to the space and not just paint on existing walls, which rarely gives a good indication due to previous colours bleeding through. By painting an A4 or bigger sample on card, it can be moved around the space at different times of day, to get a feel for what it truly looks like.
In terms of current trends, Little Greene offer a ‘grey’ colour chart with 28 options, which I think tells you everything about where the trend still is. You look at the Little Greene chart and go from Loft White to Chimney Brick at the other end of their grey spectrum, with brown and blue hues in between, so picking a grey is good decision as there will be the right shade of it to work in most applications.
The effect that colour can have on a room can be as dramatic or paired down as you want it to be, but there are many other factors that will work with the colour to create effect. Obviously, the light – natural or artificial will play the biggest part. In a deeper sense the colour will have the power to change the mood of the room and of the people in it, which is why chosen incorrectly, a room could feel cold, or the wrong choice of grey may result in a room that just didn’t feel that welcoming. With kitchen cabinetry, there is always the option of having a number of colours. This can sometimes help in the perceived zoning of a room, whereby the main working part of the painted kitchen in a large open plan space for example may be a different colour to cabinetry in another zone that may be within more of a living area. Going for a different colour island can be a bold and visually rewarding thing to do in the right application too.
You would have to say that having the ability to re paint the furniture over time to completely refresh a project is a major incentive for going down the painted kitchen route in the first place though, and with this in mind, painted kitchen furniture is likely to remain a firm favourite for many years to come.
We have stunning painted kitchens on display in each of our three McCarron & Co showrooms, so we’d be delighted to discuss your project with you.