Name: Elemental AF-400, Thicket AF-405, Agave AF-420.
Brand: Benjamin Moore Affinity Line
Sex in the City opens this week, and since Sex is in the air, I thought I’d dive into a color & sex subject that I've been wondering about for years....
Name: Elemental AF-400, Thicket AF-405, Agave AF-420.
Brand: Benjamin Moore Affinity Line
Sex in the City opens this week, and since Sex is in the air, I thought I’d dive into a color & sex subject that I've been wondering about for years....
HBO has had a slew of programs in which every other set was painted the same shade of pea soup green. I could never decide if this was because A) the color was in vogue, B) it photographed well, or C) the people in it photographed well. After HBO cancelled all my shows, I stopped watching television so I’m barely interested. I have a friend who would like to guest-write a column on “blondes in green” but until then, I leave deeper analysis to the production-designer segment of the peanut gallery.
Suffice it to say, these sets are dripping in green. I know I personally look dreadful in this color—it clashes with my complexion, I find it drab and I don’t have the Patricia Field wardrobe for added buoyancy. Yet it somehow works on camera. Blondes do bounce right off of it, redheads even more so and it’s not as cool as “Mary Tyler Moore Blue” from the 70s. The camera hates bright white, which burns out the screen, and a complacent color is needed so here we are. Let’s look at a few photos.

This wasn’t the only program on HBO to utilize pea soup green—I think their production team in the late 90s was pea green happy. Here, for example, is a still from Six Feet Under, which I think helps to contribute to its ultra-pensive melancholy: it’s drab. And I seem to remember the whole Fisher funeral home painted this color from toe top to crown.
Back to Sex in the City, Pea Soup seems to be a good foil for our peach-vodkas-n-cream complected gals, and all those fun frocks. Here are:






And on into the night. I had thought to produce downloadable “SITC” bubblegum cards for Color Therapy readers to trade with each other, but I didn’t think it would hold water with New Line.
So, reader, do you have Sex on the brain? Is this the default color de jour, does it look good on film or do you really love it? I know we’ll all be watching this movie for next season’s fashion and color cues. Let’s have a few cosmos while we study our fan decks.
Possible color matches, from the new Benjamin Moore Affinity line: Elemental AF-400, Thicket AF-405, Agave AF-420.
- Mark Chamberlain, interior and decorative painter
It makes sense when you think about Albers' color tests: a gray green is opposite on the color wheel from rosy caucasian skintones, so it makes the skin look warmer and less sallow.
view barbara's profile
Years ago, I read an article about Carrie's apartment (most likely on a HBO/Sex &.. website); I remember that the "apartment" is painted with two layers: a sort of sage green and a lavender. All so the paint doesnât look so flat.
view sepitts's profile
What I would really like is a closer look at Alexander Petrovsky's loft.... Now THAT's an apartment
view Ian B's profile
I always thought Carrie's apartment color was pretty drab, and didn't match her character. Later in the series the wall behind her bed was a pale pink, I thought it was a good change. And I too would love a tour of Petrovsky's loft...it was awesome.
view SarahinATX's profile
Sepitts, that was Miranda's place which had the green with the lavendar glaze overlay.
view Sleek's profile
I agree with SarahinATX. Carrie's apartment seems so depressing. I wouldn't want to live there.
view sarah nin's profile
Green is my fav color, but I wouldn't put most shades on the wall. The pea green with some grey is "drab"/"safe"/"Serene" enough for Carrie to escape the crazy city outside. Besides, if you have all that action outside your window wouldn't you want something different inside. Besides, Carrie isn't a beige girl, none of them are...the only one closetest would be Charlotte - but even she's more pearl pink than beige. So pea soup is a beige with some color. Especially if you want to shoes and clothes to pop more than the wall.
Big had a red wall, and it really had an impact to the space and scenes...if they did that in Carrie's place it would have felt wrong.
view nickel525's profile
Just a nitpick. It's actually Sex and the City, not "in." I'm a big fan. I had to.
view mizK's profile
Glad you said it miz K, I was about to make the same comment.
view fancyd's profile
I always thought that Carrie's apartment was painted gray (i didn't really think of it as green) because it helped create a downtown/bohemian/'tough'-new york look that would make Carrie seem cool and urban to the mostly non-new yorker viewers of the show.
view Deeliscious's profile
Nope, Sepitts is right--it is Carrie's place that has the green and lavender glaze: "soft shade of celery green washed with a lavender iridescent glaze ("it looks better on screen - it has a glow about it," Conway explains)." It's all here: http://www.hbo.com/city/interiors/carrie.shtml
view Shannon in SF's profile
My bedroom is that color. Inherited it. Dislike looking at it... but it does flatter my rosy complexion.
view pookie's profile
Carries apartment was definately drab and rather dark which served as a perfect foil to the character's M.O.; sex, writing and fashion.
view Seaside's profile
I thought it was kind of shadowy without being dark. It almost looked like if her walls were white but never hit directly with light, a vague murky color. I think set design is fascinating in general. I think there's a color theory as to how the apartment was painted and lit, and another social/psychological theory as to how to make the apartment look likely to be hers without looking like she lived in a big kooky outfit. It also resembled a real apartment in angle and height more than say, a stage set, like Friends' purple painted "Monica" apartment with turquoise kitchen and consistent bright overhead lighting. Carrie had windows and lamps and all directions, and didn't have to be overemphasized. It had enough information to look like it was her apartment without distracting.
I don't know what purpose green serves, but it was also a popular color in the world (still is), and I think blue or yellow or pink would say something different than they wanted to say. Those colors are all a lot happier than green.
view K T G's profile
Carries apartment is functional. It supports her lifestyle. The understated color is serene which supports her working (writing) there. The furniture is somewhat spare and definitely unconventional. It reveals her devotion to fashion that she would rather have a wall of bookshelves for fashion magazines, than a sofa or two for lounging, entertaining. I donât think she owned a television. Her closet is so large, and ideally compartmentalized, that she doesnât need so much in the bedroom. Her small vanity always surprised me. The kitchen has very little of use in it, because she only uses it to store take out.
Carrieâs place is simple because she needs it to be a retreat from all the full-bore energy outside. It is simple because she is all about whatâs going on outside that apartment. And it is simple because she is an average New York City renter of modest means. If she hadnât lucked into rent control, thereâd be more people in that pad or she would located in Washington Heights.
view Lady J's profile
Speaking of SATC, does anyone know where Miranda's bedsheets are from? (the pale pink ones)
view Anokha's profile
Being from Melbourne Australia, I always thought it was a New York thing. I drew this conclusion from watching SATC, Seinfeld and Friends. (Lucky I'm not a scientist) All the walls seem to be a variation on grey... So I guess it's not a NY thing then?
view TaniaTingel's profile
The color is about photography and setting off the actors against it.
But one thing I haven't see anyone mention: That big bookcase that is by Carrie's front door, they used to have at ABC Carpet & Home. It was $2400, and didn't come apart into pieces, and there is no way in hell that that bookcase could ever have been brought into a walkup apartment, like the one she lived in.
view GothamTomato's profile
Ah but the NEW carrie's apartment - painted BRIGHT royal BLUE (if I recall correctly) saw it last night :)
view roccos's profile
Okay, this is only on-topic if the topic is what flatters people's complexions, but I've always thought Samantha looked terrible as a blonde! It doesn't work with her skin at all. She always looked so pretty as a brunette, but I guess they were going for the whole "blonde bombshell" thing.
view STH's profile
I would love to know what paint color they used for Carrie's apartment in the movie - love that blue!
view mandre1108's profile
In case anyone else is interested, I found an article that gives the paint color! It's Benjamin Moore Electric Blue. http://www.chicagotribune.com/features/home/chi-sex_city_set_screen_0601jun01,0,553371.story
view mandre1108's profile
I NEED that mirrored vanity that Carrie has in her apartment after she redecorates. I have been searching and searching. Please, does anyone know where I can find it? I MUST have it! :) Thanks!
view tnbanks30's profile