Are you ready to say goodbye to crisp white cornices and skirtings?
Light Rice Half by Dulux is painted on the walls, beams and ceilings, wrapping the room with an aura of comfort without being overwhelming
The Dulux colour forecast for 2024 includes many rooms treated to ‘colour drenching’ - where the walls, ceilings, skirtings cornices and door trims are all painted one colour and the floor is made to tone in. While this technique is not new, it is being seen increasingly in the tastemaker magazines of Vogue Living, Belle and Architectural Digest among others. Why are Designers using it?
This bedroom in a Heritage listed home in Sydney has the same colour applied to the walls and skirtings, giving a more intense and saturated look. Design by Hugh Jones Mackintosh. Photo Prue Ruscoe.
Patrick O’Donnell, from Farrow and Ball, says one of the biggest benefits is to make a room look bigger, calmer and tidier. Intricate cornices, high skirtings and bulky radiators can all be painted in the same colour to create a seamless look, or for a dual tone effect, the finishes can be changed, for example, a flat finish on the walls and high gloss on trims.
Hauvette and Madani paint an intricately detailed niche bookcase in the same colour as the walls , making the grand room more cosy. Photo Francois Coquerel
A wonderfully cocooning bedroom by Cristina Celestino uses wallpaper, carpet and paint in the same shade. Photo by Pasquale Maffini
Colour drenching can be applied across different materials in the room, adding drama as the hue is varied across the different surfaces. Think stone fireplaces and kitchen islands that tone with the walls and floors, curtains, wallpaper and window trims that while the same colour, vary interestingly in tone.
The bathrooms by Studio Doherty, completed in 2022, may just have been the start of the Colour Drenching trend in Australia. Photo by Anson Smart
What are the best rooms for colour washing? In smaller rooms such as power rooms and bedrooms, this painting technique can give a ‘jewel box affect’ while pass through spaces such as entries and home offices can acquire a ‘sense of arrival’. The public areas of the home are more busy and choosing one colour to use is more difficult. I suggest here choosing a half strength of the colour you love. If you are brave enough, colour washing your living spaces is a wonderful way to make your neutral furniture ‘pop’.
Tan Wagon by Dulux on the walls and ceiling of this living room, making the white sofa and nuetral decor POP.
