Best Paint Colors for Your Home: GRAY
I’ve started something new here at Remodelaholic: The Color Files. Each week, I look around the web for beautiful rooms and furnishings that have been given a fresh coat of paint in a similar color family. Did you check out all the beautiful, moody rooms dressed in black, last week? Well, this week we’re dialing things down a shade or two, and taking a look at this year’s hottest neutral: GRAY. It’s the color du jour for designers in home, fashion, and graphics right now. And why not? Gray can actually be pretty versatile when it comes to color palettes.
I would love it if you would use the Pin It button (above) to share this post with your friends on Pinterest. If you’d like to pin individual photos, please follow the links provided and pin directly from the source. That’s good Pinterest etiquette!
I’m listing some of the gray paint colors today that I think work really well in (and on, in some cases) homes. I’ve got them going from light to dark, so that you can see how close to white some grays are, and how much variation there really is when it comes to shading and warm vs. cool. Gray really does give you a lot of options, as you’ll see in the following rooms.
Martha Stewart Gray Pearl at Dreamy Whites
Benjamin Moore Horizon at For the Love of a House
Valspar Woodlawn Colonial Gray at To Newlywedism and Beyond
Glidden Oyster Bay at Centsational Girl
Sherwin Williams Analytical at Opal Design Group (check out their nifty guide to grays HERE)
Benjamin Moore Cobblestone Cape May at Four Generations Under One Roof
Benjamin Moore Graystone at An Urban Cottage
Martha Stewart Bedford Gray at DecorPad
Benjamin Moore Cotswold at Dear Lillie
Martha Stewart Graceful Gray at Martha Stewart Living
Benjamin Moore Gunmetal Gray at Young House Love
Benjamin Moore Fairview Taupe at An Urban Cottage
So, I’m curious—have you tried any gray in your home, yet? Are you thinking about using it? What’s your favorite accent color to use with gray?
Featured picture and Pinterest friendly pictures from Better Homes & Gardens.
Cassity Kmetzsch started Remodelaholic after graduating from Utah State University with a degree in Interior Design. Remodelaholic is the place to share her love for knocking out walls, and building everything back up again to not only add function but beauty to her home. Together with her husband Justin, they have remodeled 6 homes and are working on a seventh. She is a mother of four amazing girls. Making a house a home is her favorite hobby.
We’ve got Wheat Bread by Behr in the living room- which sounds like it would have brown undertones but it totally doesn’t. It looks a lot like the Graceful Gray you listed… love love love it!
Stephanie, thanks for sharing!
We just moved into our new home we had it painted with Fading Fog by Rodda and we love it. Most of my accents so far are red, but I’m planning to add more yellow soon downstairs and some blue in our bedroom.
I just did our nursery in grey. It was harder than I thought to find the perfect shade. I wanted something on the warm side and had a tough time finding a grey that didn’t have blue undertones. I found the perfect shade at Sherwin Williams called Crushed Ice. I am using coral and aqua accents with it with white furniture. I’m very happy with how it all came together!
I just finished painting my daughters room gray… Farrow & Balls Pavilion Gray to be exact and I LOVE the color! Gray is a hard color to get right sometimes.. Thanks for putting together these great examples!
Susan, you are welcome!
I just finished a redo of our bathroom yesterday, done all in gray! I love it! Check it out here:
https://www.homeyhomedesign.com/2012/11/mini-bathroom-redo.html
Thanks for sharing more gray inspiration!
Jody, we love what you did with your bathroom! Great job!
I just bought at gallon of SW Lazy Gray during their 40% off sale and I’m really excited to see how it will turn out. Gray is a tough one!
I absolutely love grey it is the best base colour to use. Iv painted my whole house different shades of grey – the bedrooms double strength grey, feature wall and striped wall a really dark grey and the rest of the house a light grey. Lots of colours look great with it – my bedroom Iv mixed it with red and black and in my bathroom which has grey tiles Iv mixed it with yellow and white. Look forward to see your future colour posts, great idea 🙂
Thanks for the mention of our dining room 🙂 Cobblestone Cape May is indeed pretty and even prettier in person !:)
Jessica, you are welcome!
Great examples of beautiful grays!
We just did our entire house in SW mindful gray. Loving it!
You can see pictures on my blog:
https://casastephensinteriors.com/progress-at-casa-stephens/
I’ve used several different gray colors in our bungalow. We have the chunky gorgeous arts and crafts moulding that I refuse to paint white. I stained it darker with dark walnut stain because I hate the orange glow it previous had and grey just looks amazing next to it. We’ve used Martha Stewart’s Cement Grey in the kitchen and her Seal in the t.v. room and master bathroom.
I’ve also stumbled upon the perfect greige color that was an “oops” paint color so I haven’t a clue as to what it’s called. But, it’s perfect in the laundry room next to the Cement Grey.
We love our grey walls because the moulding pops and the accessories as the color back in.
Jen, it’s nice when the oops paint works in your favor.
We have a gray master bedroom. It’s a 21×11 room, so with all the wall space we did a lighter gray on 3 walls with a darker gray on the largest wall (which is where the bed sits). Our furniture is black, trim is white and the accent color is a mustardy yellow. I love it!
I love that look too!
Thanks for providing this great collection of grays!
Leslie
Love grey. I have had a grey bedroom from the last 3 years despite protests from others that it would be to cavelike. I have black furniture accents and have used both teal and now purple to bring in some colour. I am now thinking of bringing a lighter grey into the hallway to go with my newly painted black doors and white trim!
The versatility of gray amazes me. I recently tested 14 gray shades from various brands and finally (after reading Centsational Girl’s gray guide and changing my mind) found “the one,” Passive from Sherwin Williams. It’s a light, gray gray. After Sherwin Williams recent 40% off sale, I now have enough to do our combined dining and living room this week. I was also smitten with Benjamin Moore’s Eternity and a few of the other grays will probably find themselves in our other rooms. On top of that, I am a fan of the idea of black doors so down the road that could be in our house. Love the color files!
IT is great to hear of other great greys! THANKS for telling us about them! AND yes, do the black doors, I LOVED my black doors in my last house! I can’t wait to get painting my current house’s doors.
I love al the shades of gray!! it goes with everything and seems to add a touch of class to a room!!
Both my girls have a different shade of gray painted on all their walls in their room except one. The accent colors in one is lime green and in the other a pretty hot pink color. In my office, I am accenting my yellow walls with gray, white and turquois accessories.
I am loving grey too!
What a great selection of grays! It’s so tempting to paint every room in our house a different shade! We’ve made a start by using a blue-gray colour for our living room which we love! (You can check it out here: https://www.littlehouseonthecorner.com/house-tour/) The room still needs some upgrades, but we are slowly getting there.
Christine x
Christine, I clicked over to your house, and I am trying DESPERATELY not to covet your awesome house! It looks very European,… are you in England or Holland? (don’t covet… don’t covet…!)
But on a serious note, I would LOVE to have you come and do a guest house tour on my blog. Are you interested? Email me please! cassity@remodelaholic.com… please, I will try not to beg!
Wow, thank you! We’d love to do a guest house tour on your amazing blog! Can’t wait! Thanks for the encouragement! Cx
Just before I came along, Mr. Man thought he’d “upgrade” his bachelor kitchen by putting in new black/white/gray granite counter-tops. He painted the walls a dove-ish gray and painted white the awful ’70’s cabinets original to the house. The counters are great, but the pale gray is just makes it ‘blah’ and I have been at loose ends trying to figure out what to do.
This gray guide is perfect as I can see the difference painting the walls a darker, warmer shade like Graceful Gray could make a world of difference! I, too, have been stuck with the myth that gray is depressing, but none of these rooms are at all! THANK YOU!
Shannon, I think you are right. Grey can be great, but if done wrong it can be not so fun! I hope you can update your paint and make it a happy space again!
I have a love affair going on with gray right now because any color just looks awesome against it. My husband and I just painted our living room gray too. It used to be, well… gray. From gray to gray!
Jennifer, very nice. Thanks for sharing.
Just wanted to thank you for the link back to my blog. I get a lot of comments on those shelves. Fairview Taupe leans more toward brown but I’m thinking of repainting them with something a little more gray.
Nice blog!
Steve
Steve, you are welcome for the link. And thanks for liking our blog.
I am so excited about getting started with the grays in my house!