As a certified color expert, I spend most of my days helping homeowners sift through endless paint chips and talking them off the ledge of second-guessing (because trust me, we’ve all been there). But my love for New England color didn’t start in a color studio. I grew up in a home on the Historic Registry, surrounded by quirky charm and old-house soul. And later, during our own multi-year Vermont farmhouse renovation, I learned just how transformative paint can be. The right color doesn’t just change a room,  it makes an older home feel warm, grounded, and true to its bones.

Over the years, I’ve noticed I return to the same tried-and-true hues again and again. Not because I’m stuck in a rut, but because these colors work beautifully with New England architecture and light. They feel timeless, cozy, and instantly welcoming. Today, I’m sharing those five go-to colors with you, plus the color principles behind why they’re so reliable.

Photo Credit: Crisp Architects

What Paint Colors Are Best for a New England Home?

You might be thinking, Why would paint colors behave differently here? I promise, they do. New England homes come with a special set of characteristics that influence how colors show up on your walls. Here’s what makes this region unique:

• Cooler, softer natural light. Many of my clients, especially those in rural areas, also get strong green reflections from surrounding woods, fields, and mountains especially in the summer months.
• Antique or unpainted wood tones. Older homes often feature warm, rich wood that plays beautifully with some colors and completely clashes with others. Add to that slate tile floors in the mudroom and brick fireplaces, and you have distinct russet browns and reddish earth tones that must be considered when picking paint colors.
• Classic architecture. Colonial lines, farmhouse bones, millwork, and low ceilings give older homes charm but can also create darker spaces. The right paint color can enhance this character instead of fighting against it.
• Major seasonal shifts. Summer sun washes colors out; winter brings cool shadows that make some hues look minty, dingy or muddy. The goal is to choose colors that ride these swings gracefully.
• Bright whites can fall flat. If clean modern whites feel harsh, sterile, or oddly gray in your home, you’re not imagining it. Luckily, there’s a workaround.
• Timeless New England style favors earthy, desaturated color. Ou color palette in New England is rooted in Colonial Pigments. As a result, low-chroma colors (aka dirty colors) and historically inspired hues feel naturally at home here (and no, you don’t have to stick to the “Historic” fan deck to get the look!)

With that foundation in mind, here are the five paint colors I recommend over and over for New England homes.

1. Warm, Creamy Off-Whites

It’s hard to pick a favorite, but one of my most reliable creamy off whites that looks gorgeous (even in the darkest spaces) is Sherwin Williams Dover White. This is the white paint I go to again and again for ceilings, trim and white walls.

Sherwin Williams Dover White. Photo Credit: @hatcliffconstruction

Why We Love Dover White By Sherwin Williams

• One of the biggest mistakes I made when we bought our 1790s farmhouse was painting the walls of our dark dining room White Dove by Benjamin Moore. What I didn’t know was that certain white paints look terrible in dark spaces! Silly me, I was just trying to brighten it up.
• What I learned in my Color Expert Certification traing is that this is a common misconception. In fact, bright whites can look flat or dingy in low light, but creamy whites glow in dark interiors with small windows or porches overhanging. Warm whites with yellow undertones can even handle the cool northern light we get in the winter!
• Now I know that Dover White is stunning in low light rooms. It has the same high LRV (83) as White Dove but carries more warmth, perfect for darker New England rooms.
• It plays beautifully with antique furniture, patina-rich wood, and traditional trim.
• While it isn’t stark, sterile, or overly yellow it also feels classic, cozy, and quietly historic.
• I highly suggest considering a warm off-white like Dover White as a softer alternative for trim when you want white but not builder-basic white.

Best for: Trim, ceiling and anywhere you want to use white. It looks great in foyers, on kitchen cabinets, living rooms, bedrooms and hallways.

2. Soft Beiges, Taupes & Warm Greiges

I feel like a broken record sometimes, but I will happily admit that Sherwin Williams Neutral Ground is one of my most recomended paint shades when coming up with clients home color combination . I literally cannot count the number of clients for whom I have specified this creamy warm neutral beige paint color!

But don’t run away when you hear me say “beige” this is much softer and lighter than the beige paints of yore. This is much lighter and not as intensely yellow of the beiges of the early 2000s.

Neutral Ground on The walls with darker contrast trim in a mudroom. Photo: @buildingacasehouse

Why It Works

• Neutral Ground handles both summer’s strong directional light and winter’s cool blue shadows.
• A higher LRV (70) brightens darker homes with low ceilings and small windows.
• Feels grounding and warm during long winter months.
• Doesn’t clash with earthy fixed elements like brick and antique floors.
• A perfect backdrop for the muted greens, reds, and blues often found in historic New England homes. Having a workhorse neutral like Neutral Ground is key when using an accented neutral scheme for interior design.

Best For: living rooms, dining rooms, parlors, historic trim moments

3. Earthy Sage Greens

Examples: Benjamin Moore Nantucket Gray (shown above in my office) or Sherwin Williams Grassland

Why It Works

• Soft, muted, low-chroma greens feel naturally at home in New England’s landscapes and historic architecture.
• Timeless without drifting into “colonial kitsch.”
• Beautiful for cabinetry, wainscotting, and even exterior trim.
• Adds color while keeping the overall palette calm and refined.
• Looks great with muddy and complex undertones of fixed elements like stone, brick and aged wood.

Best For: mudrooms, kitchens, libraries, guest rooms

4. Dusty Gray-Blues

When I meet with my clients before our color consulting appointments, I always make sure to ask what colors they are drawn to. Three quarters of the time the answer is often greens or blues. When I sift back through the paint schedules I have created, these dusty blues come up time and time again.

Examples: Brewster Gray, Wales Gray, Templeton Gray, Puritan Gray (all Benjamin Moore)

Brewster Gray by Benjamin Moore is a perfect example of a New England paint color that can be used on walls, trim or accents and always feels timeless.

Why It Works

• All of these above mentioned blue gray paint colors have enough weight for traditional millwork but stay soft and livable thanks to gentle graying.
• These mid tones vibe effortlessly with historic wood, clear old-growth pine planks, aged oak, even yellow-leaning maple.
• Look New England coastal, farmhouse, or traditional depending on your styling.
• I love these colors for reverse trim in spaces with lots of ornamental woodwork.

Best For: Stairwells with tons of woodwork, bathrooms, bedrooms, mudrooms, breezeways, Federal-era home’s foyers and stately home offices.

5. Earthy, Desaturated Reds (Brick Tones)

While red is not a paint color that comes to mind for most people, earthy brick colored pigments are traditional early New England and always look at home in the classic homes of the North East. I use these red paint colors in moderation for my paint schemes. The key is to use them for a pop of contrast!
Examples: Benjamin Moore Audubon Russet, Walnut and Boston Brick

A rusty red bench in a mudroom gives a pop of contrast. Photo: @sanfordcollectiveinteriors

Why It Works

• Browned, earthy reds with warm undertones feel rooted and authentic, never costume-y like blue or purple-leaning burgundies. I love those that look like they were created using natural pigments.
• Provide the “pop” most color schemes need while still looking natural and historic.
• Perfect for unexpected moments of charm: interior doors, stair risers, a kitchen island, or built-ins.
• Echo classic New England barn reds and brick tones.

Best For: front doors, dining rooms, interior doors, built-ins

How to Choose the Right Color for Your New England Home

Keep these principles in mind as you narrow your options:

• Pay attention to light direction, it changes everything. North facing rooms and those with small windows or low ceilings get less warm direct light and the colors will need to be adjusted accordingly.
• Consider your wood undertones, they’re part of the palette whether you want them to be or not. A lot of older wood floors and beams have orange tones which pair well with blues and greens but clash with taupes. Keep that in mind when you are picking your main neutral and your highlight colors.
• Look down. Your floors matter more than most people realize. As do the other fixed elements in your home including brick, stone and slate.
• Your personal style determines how muted or saturated you should go. While traditional New England colors are based on colonial era pigments, if you prefer a bit more saturation, the key is keeping it consistant throughtout your whole home palette.

The post The Essential New England Color Palette: 5 Foolproof Paint Colors for Classic Homes appeared first on A Season For Home.

Lauren Shadid Architecture + Interiors

First of all, let’s preface this discussion by saying I am not a fan of calling colors “dirty” because that connotes they are bad. I personally prefer these so-called “dirty” colors over clean ones! When working with clients to pick out their home color palettes, I like to call dirty colors “low chroma”, “muted”, “complex”, “earthy” etc. Conversely, I refer to clean colors as high chroma, pure and bright.

The first time I heard a color described as “clean” I had already achieved my degree in Art, but I had never heard of clean colors or dirty colors before. {I had heard about the importance of keeping my brushes clean when creating a painting, but that was it!}

Knowing the difference between clean and dirty colors was essential in doing my job as a design assistant! My boss was a well-known color expert and in the Color Marketing Group. Before she sent me out into the design center to bring back samples of “red” fabric, she taught me that even a subtle difference in chroma can really make or break a color scheme.

In this post, I will go over what a clean color is, when to use them and when not to! I will also share some examples so you can SEE just what I am talking about!

Essential Color Vocabulary

Before we get into clean vs dirty colors, I need to go over a little bit of vocabulary and color theory. There are four terms that are essential to understanding what a clean color is: Hue, Value, Saturation and Chroma. If you already know these terms, jump ahead to What Is Clean Color in the following section.

What is hue?

In color theory, hue refers to the pure, base color of the spectrum, such as red, blue, yellow, green, etc. Hue is the color’s name.

• Primary hues: Red, blue, yellow (cannot be created by mixing other colors).
• Secondary hues: Green, orange, violet (created by mixing two primary hues).
• Tertiary hues: Red-orange, yellow-green, etc. (created by mixing a primary with an analogous or adjacent secondary hue).

What is Color Value?

Another property of color is value, which refers to the lightness or darkness of a color. In talking about house paints we measure this in a scale called Light Reflectance Value (LRV). LRV measures the amount of visible light a color reflects, on a scale from 0 (absolute black, no light reflected) to 100 (pure white, maximum light reflected).

• Colors with a high value (or high LRV) are lighter, like soft pastels or whites, which reflect more light.
• Colors with a low value (or low LRV) are darker, like deep navy or charcoal, which absorb more light.

If that doesn’t make a ton of sense to you, maybe this will help. During a color consultation I tell clients to forget all about the hue of the color when trying to understand value and instead think of a gray scale from white to black and everything in between. Once you can visualize that you can understand value.

What is Saturation?

The third key property of color is saturation which refers to the amount of pigment in a color. It describes how vivid or intense a color appears. As an artist, I describe it like this: The more of a single hue pigment you add to the base or paint medium the more you will increase the saturation. Saturation is a relative term that serves in proportion to a colors value.

What is Chroma?

The last vocab word to know for this discussion is chroma. This term is often confused with hue, but they’re different. Here’s how:

• Hue is the basic, pure color on the spectrum, like red, blue, or green. It defines the “type” of color based on its position on the color wheel. Hue answers the question, “What color is it?”
• Chroma, on the other hand, refers to the purity of a color. It measures how clean or dirty a color is. It measures how much gray a hue has.

For example, both a bright firetruck red and a muted brick red share the same hue (red), but their chroma levels differ. The firetruck red has high chroma, while the brick red has low chroma.

High chroma means the color is a pure hue, while low chroma means gray, brown or a complimentary color is added into the pure hue to make it appear more muted, muddied or grayish.

What is a Clean Color?

It is important to understand that colors have hue, value and saturation. Each property can be tweaked to change the color! And it is important to understand any hue (green, blue, red etc) can have variations that are either clean or dirty!

A clean color is a high chroma color, whereas a dirty color is a low chroma color.

A clean color is a hue that is pure, bright, fresh and simple. When talking about mixing colors on the color wheel, a clean color is a single pure hue or one made from mixing two primary (or analogous colors.)

Clean colors do not have other pigments (from across the color wheel) to muddy them.

Conversely, a dirty color will appear more muted and complex. They’re a little more je ne se quoi! Like an expensive perfume that has a touch of musk, these dirty colors often have a touch of their complimentary color blended in in a small amount to make them less stark.

Below you can see two kitchens. One uses a clean palette and the other a dirty palette.

Above Left: In the first example on the left the aqua blue cabinets and orange pillows are clean colors.

Above Right: In the second photo on the right, the cabinets are a more complex blue-gray-green and they are paired with a rug with complex earth tones. The second palette is all dirty colors.

When To Use Clean Colors

• Use clean colors to decorate your home if you love them and prefer them over dirty colors.
• If you like a fresh, bright look.
• If your fixed elements in your interior space (like countertops, flooring and unchangeable surfaces like fireplace surrounds) are mostly cool grays.
• If you love to decorate with black and white with pops of colors. Clean colors look awesome in these spaces.

When To Avoid Clean Colors

• Do not use clean colors when your fixed elements are warm and earthy. For example, if you have travertine floors or tile or a brown granite countertop you will have an easier time working with low chroma colors.
• In general, if you like to decorate with mostly cream and beige you should avoid clean colors. When paired with warm neutrals clean colors can look jarring and brash.
• Most importantly, don’t use them if you don’t like them. Before every color consultation, I work with a client to determine if they prefer one over the other using sample images and a shared Pinterest board. It is important to surround yourself with the colors you love. So if you lean toward more muted subdued tones don’t decorate with clean colors.

Color Rule: Do not Mix Clean and Dirty Colors

You will also want to avoid them if your whole house is already decorated with more muted colors. Which brings me to the most important part of this post: you should not mix clean and dirty colors!

Don’t worry there are clean and dirty versions of all the colors so you’ll still be able to decorate with all your favorite colors, you just need to pick the right ones, and then keep in the same color family.

For example I have two monochromatic blue color schemes above that show the use of both types of colors. Both look great! It’s just a matter of deciding which one you like better, and sticking with it.

When picking a color scheme for your house, it is important to keep the chroma of the colors in the same range so they all live happily together.

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Examples of Mixing Dirty and Clean Colors

Now let’s look at a few examples showing color schemes where clean and dirty got mixed together. Below on the left you can see a color scheme which is comprised of all clean colors plus one low chroma yellow, aka dirty color. (I picked Lapland, AF-410.)

On the right the exact same palette is used swapping in a cleaner yellow color for the Lapland. Take a moment to study these two!

Once you study the two palettes it is clear that breaking the rule of mixing clean and dirty colors is a rule for a reason! That said, there are exceptions to this, but in general leave the rule-breaking to the experts who know when they can get away with it.

Or perhaps you may be thinking, well maybe Lapland is just an ugly color. Not so! When Laplad is paired with other colors with a similar chroma, ones that are equally dirty, it is a real beauty of a color! See below how harmonious it looks in an all-dirty palette.

When paired with these other complex shades, all of which are muted hues, it suddenly seems just right!

How Can I Tell If a Color is Clean or Dirty?

The best way to know if your color is clean or dirty is to compare it to another hue in the same family. Colors are always affected by what is next to them, so to study them, understand their undertones and determine if they have a low or high chroma you must compare them to a control color.

To find the undertone of neutrals, we use a gray to find them. However, to see the chroma of a colors you have to use the most “primary” version of the color for best results.

For example, if I wanted to find out if my yellow was dirty or clean I would place a paint chip of a brighter, saturated yellow next to it to compare it. That way you can see the undertones.

To complicate matters… there are varying degrees of dirty or cleanliness too! Oh no! Remember this image we just talked about (shown again above) when I added Dorset Gold into our “clean” palette to fix the problem Lapland created??? Well, I have news. Dorset Gold is fairly “dirty” when compared to an even cleaner yellow! So in other words, it is always relative.

How To Pick The Right Level Of Chroma

Let’s say you read all this and you’re more confused than ever. There’s good news.

• Go Historical: Many paint companies have historical color palettes and in general, these colors are all on the dirty end of the spectrum. So if you’re not sure, and you prefer more muted and complex colors you can stick to picking from the historical deck.
• Use a Curated Brand: In general, all of Farrow and Ball colors are dirty and are curated so that you can pair them easily.
• Use Only One Deck or Collection: Sherwin Williams recently launched some color capsules. I also like the Affinity colors collection from Ben Moore for picking a palette within the same range of chromatic cleanliness.
• If you like clean colors, the Sherwin-Williams fan deck separates out the clean colors nicely.
• And if you’re not sure still, maybe it is time for a one-on-one color consultation with me! I am booking online virtual color consultations for interiors and exteriors as well as in-person color consultations in Vermont only.

The post Clean Colors: What are they? appeared first on A Season For Home.