Paint Job Gone Wrong: Part 3

Believe it or not, I think I've found the paint color that I want to use to cover up the paint disaster in our upstairs hallway. Thank you to everyone who commented and gave input in the last article about this. I think the paint color called Latte was the clear "winner". So, after some more thinking and comparing and shopping around, I've actually decided on a paint color called "Manchester Tan" which is very similar to Latte, but just a shade darker (for a little more contrast).

Manchester Tan is one of Pottery Barn's select paint colors for Fall 2010 (Did I mention that I love Pottery Barn? Well, I do!). Pottery Barn's magazines use all paint colors by Benjamin Moore Paints - a very popular brand for interior decorating - and as I was flipping through the fall catalog online, I noticed that quite a few of the pages name the paint color used on that page. And then I discovered that a different part of the website will show you all of their selected fall paint colors and you can see what they look like in a room (although I must warn you that several of the colors looked quite different online compared to what the actual paint swatch looked like in person). So, this is how I came across this color called Manchester Tan and thought it might work well in the hallway.

Lucky for me, we have a little hardware store down the road that just happens to sell Benjamin Moore paint, and so I stopped by to have a looksy at the different colors and grab a few swatches to take home for comparisons.

However, it just so happens that the store didn't have an individual swatch of Manchester Tan in particular (even though they had all the other colors) - to which I was very disappointed - but to compensate, the nice helper lady gave me an entire little fan deck of all of Pottery Barn's Fall 2010 paint colors! And I thanked her profusely as I can now carry this around in my purse forever and ever - along with the other paint swatches from the other colors I've used in the house - and use it when I'm in other stores picking out fabric and accessories and all kinds of things that need to coordinate. That's the beauty of a paint swatch! (I'm psychotic. I know.)

After I got home, I went upstairs and compared Manchester Tan to the trim and the bad paint that I had used previously, and I liked it very much. It is definitely less peachy/pinky than the original color (although it may be hard to tell in the picture below). In fact, it's exactly the right shade of tan. Perect.

Here is another shot of the hallway looking down at the stairwell. You can view the Shale blue color that I'm using in my downstairs hall and see that it actually creeps into the upstairs as well. I haven't finished this wall yet but the blue will actually cover 1 whole wall of the upstairs (since the wall flows from the downstairs) and the other 3 walls, including the window wall seen below, will have the Manchester Tan on them.

This shows the Manchester Tan right next to the Shale blue. Beautiful.

So there you have it! The final decision is made. Now it's time to put this plan into action and pray the results turn out better than the last time!

Hopefully, the next post on this topic will show you those results! Hopefully...



Pssst... you can order Pottery Barn's Paint fan deck online for $2.00 or pick up a complimentary fan deck for FREE at your local Pottery Barn Store!