I find pink to be very polarizing. No other color has so many die-hard fans; no other color produces such feelings of distaste. It's baby girls, it's breast cancer awareness, it's Pepto Bismol, it's Barbie. When it comes to decorating, the conventional wisdom regarding pink is to tread lightly. You don't want to be overwhelmed. Or do you?
Here are 15 interiors with walls painted in varying shades of pink, from barely there to bubble gum to magenta. What do you think? Which rooms are just pink enough — and which ones are too much?
First Row:
1. Made by Girl
2. Design*Sponge
3. Domino via We Love Domino
4. Lonny
5. Domino via Brides
Second Row:
6. Elle Decor UK via Apartment Therapy
7. Domino via We Love Domino
8. Jonathan Adler Interior Design
9. Design*Sponge
10. Domino via We Love Domino
Third Row:
11 & 12. NY Mag via Apartment Therapy
13. Cool Hunting
14. Lo Bjurulf for Elle Interiör
15. Elle Decor
Images: As linked above.
















Sprout Side Table
There is no such thing as too much Pink.
Polarizing indeed. Any pink is too much pink for me!
I'm with you, Amy T.
I love the super pale, almost white pinks (like picture 2). I've been thinking about it for our kitchen. The darker, pepto pink can be overwhelming, but I really like it in #s 12 and 14... maybe because the less-girly furnishings help balance it?
I'm actually thinking about pale pink and red w/pops of pale green for my studio. I heart soft and pink decor.
I don't mind pink, but I don't know that I'd paint a room with it. Maybe. It doesn't get me riled up the way that red or yellow do (two colors I REALLY hate in large amounts).
Really don't like pink--but coral is to die for!
Interestingly enough, I was just playing with the Sherwin Williams Color things to pick out a color for my bathroom. I really like the cool light pink in pic 5.
I'm definitely on the can't have enough pink side; I actually painted the outside of my house the brightest hot pink I could find.
I lived in an apartment where all the walls were the color of the 2nd photo. It was an amazing color - your brain took it as just an off-white, but the warmth and coziness it gave was incredible. It definitely made me a pink convert. Right now, I have 2 pink, original MCM bathrooms - a 1/2 bath and a full. I'm trying to convince my husband we should keep both (he's only amenable to the 1/2 at the moment, but I am very patient...)
Lighting is critical with deeper shades of pink, more so than any other color I've used before. I painted my living room a shade of pink similar to that in the sixth photo, and while I loved it during the day when drenched in natural sunlight, it turned sickly pepto bismal with artificial light at night. I repainted it grey, and it is such a relief.
<3 #7 and #4 ... maybe i just like pink + orange and pink + warm wood (confession: most of my apartment has pink walls, similar to #7, so I'm biased)
If you think of pepto or bazooka, too pink!
Is it weird that I like the 1st and 3rd rows, but hate the middle row. It appears that I think pink is best when it's barely there or overwhelming.
I have been forced to despise pink in reaction to the whole Disney Princess Barbie Girl-Version-Of-Things phenomenon. Pink laptop computers! Pink phones! Pink cordless power drills! Pink colostomy bags! All of the rooms in the examples above are really designed well, and the pink looks great because the rooms aren't super-girly, but I could never bring myself to use the color in my own home due to of the cultural associations with recent over-pinkified bogus-girl-power marketing ploys. (disclosure: I am a woman)
Every house, condo, and townhouse I have owned has been 'pink', although I prefer rose, specifically Monticello Rose, (Benjamin Moore Historical Color #63), the original color of the first floor at Monticello.
Thomas Jefferson had a slave who was a master colorist, and he made many colors for Mr. Jefferson. The Monticello Rose can be a little intense when the sun is setting, but it is an amazing color that seems to change during the day. But at night, it's magical. It was originally discovered/mixed before electricity, and it is most beautiful in candlelight. It will take your breath away.
'Pink', or those colors in the rose family, as I understand it, are the most soothing of colors; they can even lower your heart rate. If you have been in the homes of the really, really rich, many of them have rose colored walls. (I think most of the rest have celedon.) Again, the salmon color soothes the soul of the most savage beast.
AN ASIDE: I had the strangest nursery you can imagine. The wallpaper had a dark brown background, with tiny little yellow and orange flowers, and I mean tiny. All the furniture was painted the same dark brown. AND MY MOTHER WAS A DECORATOR. And a good one too. She must have been under the influence of hormones when she designed that (*)(*). I have often wondered if that is why I have craved the rose colored walls all my life.
All my walls are white in our home but I put a barbie pink just on one wall in my young daughters room (just on the inside door wall so can't be seen from outside her room) She thinks it's one of the best thing in our house and it casts a rosey glow over her face in the mornings.
We had a beautiful delicate pale pink bedroom in a San Francisco Edwardian that I spent a fortune having professionally painted with a custom-blended Farrow & Ball paint (the crazy trim was too much for me to work around). The light was amazing, it was like being in the middle of a sunrise, everyone looked gorgeous in that room. Even my husband, not a pink fan (and very skeptical initially) liked it. Sadly we ended up moving out after only a year due to deciding to move back to Los Angeles. The owners of the (condo) unit moved back in and got to enjoy the beautiful paint job throughout the apartment (all Farrow & Ball throughout, we had thought we would be there at least five years and it would be worth it-- mostly greys and creams). I was too afraid to ask what they thought of the bedroom though! I really hope they appreciate it since I still think of it longingly.
I love pink, always have, always will. In my late teens I painted my bedroom in my parents' house the lightest shade of pink that I could find, kind of like the second image. It looks almost white for most of the day and aged really well.
Picture 8 looks like it came straight from an 80s magazine...
I love all the rooms especially the last two, but after a while it would get on my nerves, and I would want a total overhaul.
i'm not a pink person, but I love Magenta!
I usually like only orangeish pink, like #7, coral, shrimp, salmon...
everything on the last row is TOO pink. I adore all the other rooms though.
As a kid I loved pink. Then for some reason in my teens and early twenties, I tried to fight it. I'm back in love with it, and will probably paint my kitchen pink very soon. I like a soft, but noticeable pink (No. 1,3-5). The pink in #2 makes me think the decorator was too shy or nervous about a more noticeable shade of pink.
I like light pink and fushia but the middle range pinks are normally too pepto bismal but all the colors in the photos above are nice. Why does everyone seem to hate pepto bismal pink. I never hear anyone complain that a green is too Listeriney.
I actually used to REALLY hate pink. Even when I was a little girl. I wanted to paint my room navy blue (of course I wasn't allowed to :P). But now I think I'm learning how and when to use it. It's like any other color. It has it's place.
I think room #7 did it right. Just whimsical enough to pull off. The rest are too garish.
I'm in love with #7. It's like living inside of a seashell. Or a sunset. I'm convinced that there's a pink for everyone. My pink is more coral than bubblegum, and I prefer it paired with woods and tans rather than white. Pink soooo doesn't have to be "little girl." Just come over to my house and see for yourself. :)
I wouldn't paint my walls pink, but I do like little pops of fuchsia here and there.
I'm usually more of a dusty pink girl but I agree #7 is by far my favorite. Very Royal Tenenbaums.
I used to hate pink as a kid. Hated it! Now, I actually really like it - but only the really bright, characterful, OBVIOUS pinks. Mostly as an accent colour, though. If it's a wall colour, it's just a little much.
I love the painting! Does anyone know where I can get that kind of paintings?
I can only handle the super pale pink. That said, our bedroom is super super pale and every night when I go to bed, I consider repainting or death.
13 and 15 are too much for me. It's probably because 13 is "in your face rocker pink". That amount of pink is best for one item. I have hot pink vases on our entry table that give the room just enough color. I really like 1-6, but 7 is the best (IMO). That said, pink is hard. I want to decorate my nursery in pink but don't want it to be too twee, or too tween, either. ;)
I've always been in the "ick" camp on this one, but after some experience with lighting and scenic design, I've come to realize how very flattering a pale pink can be. It reflects this perfect light that nearly everybody looks amazing in...I'll also own up to liking the occasional punch colored something - but I'd never buy one!
I love hot fuschia -- it's what I painted my daughter's room, and it was a very popular co our in France a few years ago.
Pale pink though I find looks better if peachy instead of icy.
Love that "Pink is the navy blue of Inda"!
Little AdelaideKate -- try a peachy-pink!
Check out the paler pinks on the Pratt&Lambert co our card which feature Chinese Orange... They are sublimely beautiful candle-lit pinks.
I recently painted our 1956 original-fixtured bathroom a very pale pink called, appropriately, "Bubble Bath" from the Olympic line at Lowe's. I love it and it doesn't scream "pink" at you when you walk in. It's very subtle and casts a nice glow, as opposed to the ugly, chalky contractor white that was in there. Even the boys in my house are on board with it.
Any pink is too pink
I am very pro-pink. The hotter, the better!
i'm not into pink, but i have seen some rooms done very well in the really pale pinks, or the super intense saturated fuchsias. i will say, though, that i LOVE what it does for my skin when looking in a mirror - like a pink bathroom i have to use at work
I look much healthier in my pink bathroom's mirror than I did in the green.
I actually love pink and would love a light or medium pink. Maybe even a crazy bright pink if used on one wall. But the last row of pictures just abuse pink to the point where it looks sick. Bleh.
ditto bepsf
I love, love love the pink, but then I love this chair:
http://squirrelkingthemovie.blogspot.com/2011/10/robins-pink-chair.html