apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

I know it was a hot color not so long ago, and in the right hands i'm sure could look lovely, but almost anything mauve - especially walls - would not make me happy. so not my bag.

also, anything that resembles a flesh tone. yuck.

I painted my dining room Benjamin-Moore Tuscon Red (a deeper, warmer red) with the Aura paint and love the look. It went up in two coats, but I had some problems with the Matte finish looking kind of patchy still. It's also so thick that I ended up with obvious brushstrokes in areas where I cut it with a brush. I haven't had this problem with other paints before, so I don't know if it's the Aura, or if my technique is lacking. Anyone else have this happen?

Real Estate "beige" You know, the neutral color everyone paints an interior when they are putting their home on the market...I would almost rather they didnt paint at all considering Im gonna paint over whatever is there anyway.

I used Aura this weekend in grey cashmere. It went up really easily in only one coat, no stroke/streak problems, but when i took the tape off the next day some paint peeled off the walls! Any advice on touching that up (two of the spots are LARGE) or do I need to recoat the whole thing?

I'm moving next week, and my new house features two, yes two, least favorite colors. Every wall that isn't another specific color is pancake batter yellow. That's going to have to stay for a little while. The bedrooms are both flesh toned. That will change right away.

While house hunting, I saw a few more atrocities. Each room of one house was a super-bright primary color or an awful mix. For example, the purple room looked like they took the leftover paint from the red room and poured it into the leftover paint from the blue room. The result was a muddy, nasty purple. Shudder.

On a positive note, I used aura for my current bathroom and loved it. It was so frustratingly close to covering in one coat, though, that I was sad to have to use two.

every colour my new renovation rental apartment is painted - skintone beige, lilac bathroom (with fake blue marble tiles), and hangover-throw-up beigeypink in the kitchen. i never want to see these colours again.

i agree with those above- any color that resembles flesh tones, make-up, or bandaids makes me cringe

The color can be bad depending on the room too...I would say a HORRIBLE color for a bathroom would be chartreuse, or any kind of green with a lot of yellow in it. It will make anyone's skin tone look awful. On the flip side, years ago, I talked to a great interior designer who said she always uses white with a powdery pink base (barely discernable) in bathrooms, because it makes everyone's skin look lovely and glowing. And you know what, she was right.

Any beige (ooh ... and peach!) - I pretty much hate anything beige at all. I also used to despise powder blue because my parents had the most awful nautical-themed bathroom in powder blue when i was growing up, but ... I've seen seen some gorgeous pale blues in some better contexts than that bathroom so now I like it.

I'm with you on the Pepto bismol (dismal??!!) pink, but something weird is happening in my home right now with this color ... I am in the midst of repainting my bedroom after repairs from some rain damage, and I painted the room this color (Benjamin Moore ... Can't remember the shade) as an under-layer to a paint effect. (When it's done, you won't even see the bubble-gum pink really) However, the last few weeks I haven't had time to do the top layer paint effect and I have to say the pepto is growing on me ... At least as an idea for a nursery.

I love a nice hot hot hot pink....and I think I just bought a poster in bubble gum pink.

Each to his own I suppose!

What exactly is everyone referring to when saying 'flesh-colored' paint? What color flesh, all of them?

I really love all colors. For me, it truly is contextual.

ccs -

I think they mean the color that comes in the crayon box that says "flesh" on it, which is pretty much a Caucasian peachy-pinky-beige skin color.

Actually, I think that sometimes colors near that one can be kind of warm and nice, depending on the context.

Salmon is the absolute worst color. I once lived in a building with hallways painted in a glossy salmon. No, it wasn't the 80s. Yes, it was horrible.

Bettencourt Green Building Supply will match any color with no VOC paint and I think my order for 2 gallons came to $84 or so which would make it cheaper than the aura line...

http://www.apartmenttherapy.com/ny/brooklyn/bart-bettencourt-green-design-supplies-000559

I have to agree with some of the others that it's so contextual...and there are SO many colors out there, that it's hard to classify all beiges as horrible and all reds as nice or something like that, in my opinion.

To the "Don't Use" list, I'd add...

Cement gray (too institutional)
Mauve (any shade)
Blue (any shade - it's been done to death)

I've seen walls painted in colors that I normally hate look really good. Depends on the lighting and surrounding decor. Maybe I COULD like a mauve or blue room?

Hunter green, loden green, forest green, olive green. I loath dark green walls. At best these colors belong on a billiards table, at worst they look like a cave.

I am not fond of wine reds, chocolate browns, or other colors that read close to black in dim light at night.

It's interesting, isn't it. People using "flesh" to describe a color, when most people of the world don't have anything near that color on their skin. Very white-centric to use flesh to describe a wan pink color. Crayola changed that crayon for that very reason.

Many flesh tones of black people look really awesome in rooms and are quite trendy right now.

Dark purple -- ugh! I really, really hate dark mauve and forest green, too. Reminds me of bad suburban fake hunting-lodge "dens."

Incidentally, here's my office. It's a pretty crazy color of pink. It looked horribly Pepto when I first painted it, but it feels good when I'm in there. Nice and bright for an overcast Seattle day.

http://flickr.com/photos/halfmad/2341446659/

Crayola came out with a pack of flesh toned markers in the mid-nineties that is far more representative than the original "flesh" crayola.

I can't stand maroons, or "wine reds". Ditto on forest green.

yellow is number one on my list -- closely followed by all shades of beige, and certain pallettes -- the "traditional" pallette, with hunter green, tan, and hunting red (occasionally complemented by teddy bear brown); and garish bright pallettes that are popular in certain places back home -- they often feature bright yellow, a bright blue, orange, and purple, often with green mixed in (believe it or not, I am thinking of houses I have been to...).

I also hate peach, and especially peach combined with silvery grey and silvery green. Very popular in hospital clinic waiting rooms.

I painted 2 walls in my daughter's room fuschia -- just like the "P " in THERAPY above. since it didn't look right with the builder's off-white the rest of the room was painted (it needed a crisp white), I painted one wall about a 50% tint of it -- sort of a Barbie pink, which I personally hate. but in this context, with a lot of white on it (expedit shelving unit with drawers, etc.), it looks good.

ljh - you need to remove the tape while the paint is still wet. The paint will peel off (doesn't matter what brand you use) if you wait until it dries.

I agree... The Aura Paint is bad ass!

Any color that's too pure and saturated is wrong for most walls. Colors with lots of different hues within them tend to look best to me and also harmonize better with whatever is inside the room. They allow more design flexibility. I like complex colors that are hard to name and change dramatically in different lighting. I hate it when houses that are painted in wild palettes with no thought or system are called "artistic."

Red with yellow is the worst color combo—ever, for anything. And yet it seems to enjoy a long and stalwart following among those who want a "cottage" look. More like a fast food look!

Context matters. A salmon hallway would suck depending on the type of lighting. Pepto pink can be mitigated by other things.

It comes down to context.

We used Aura in our home and love the quality. But I do have a complaint about their white, Frostine--when you look at their samples, it looks like a pure white. We tried painting swatches and saw nothing wrong with it. Then we painted two coats (along with a primer) and realized that in a certain light it has a green tinge to it, just like a glacier! Hence the name Frostine.

I think it really depends on the people and the room. Beige might be okay with the right lighting and decor, but it's usually used to suck all the personality out of a room.

Then again, my bedroom when I was a kid was painted white with kelly green trim and I still love it.

yes. it does come down to context.

The last house i lived in had a neon-yellow/green bathroom with this brown-ish purple paneling. ughhh.
i have a strong dislike for certain shades of dark red.. especially when glossy.
of course beige and off-whites (in most cases)

my favorite wall color is grey. grey with white trim.
i would love to paint all the rooms of a house in different shades of grey. let the art and furniture provide the color.

TEAL makes me angry.

Almost any color can look horrible depending on the context, and some colors you would never think would work, some people somehow do make it work. It all depends on the light in the room and what folks do to it.

peach, seafoam green, forest green, and most shades of beige are probably colours I would never ever use. I am not a big fan of coloured walls in my own house anyway- I like whites and greys mostly with any colour coming from furnishings, etc. I had to fight our realtor not to paint our loft "beige" for the open house.

farmhouse, you MUST be thinking of the apartment I moved into last fall...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/24801165@N04/

The kitchen is yellow with a red accent wall. Gross!

When I was looking for my first house, I encountered one house that had bright gold-yellow walls with black floors and another that had crayon-purple walls and hot pink plush carpeting. I couldn't get past the colors to actually consider liking the houses...

my bedroom is bright pink, or hot pink, with brown and I love it. I also have white accents. It is gorgeous, but I like color

Maroon, Forest green & lime green

dark purple (eggplant), deep brown, mustard yellow

ljh - you always peel it off asap when you're done painting. don't wait until the next day or it peels.

As a corporate relocation director for a real estate firm in the Midwest, part of my responsibility is to manage corporate inventory homes when individuals have been transferred to another location and left their homes to be sold by their employer. A lot of these employers in effect “purchase” the home from the employee so they have the equity out of the home to purchase in a new location. It then becomes my job to ready these homes for the open market and get them sold. Neutralizing is a basic in my industry. I have seen some wallpaper and paint combinations you wouldn’t believe. I even have a PowerPoint presentation I use from time to time for certain meetings, etc. that shows some of these creative uses color. We use a color called “Biscuit” for neutralizing most homes. It’s a soft light taupe color. What we’ve found is that most potential buyers have a very hard time visualizing what a home will look like without wallpaper and/or “custom” or designer colors. Also, most buyers today don’t want to re-hab houses and have to paint, etc. after they move in (especially in the higher price ranges). They want to move in, put their stuff away and go on with their life. All that said I love colors and just painted one bedroom wall a deep chocolate brown – which will have to be “neutralized” should we ever decide to sell this home. Just my 0.2 cents and a little different perspective.

Trish

Kelly green, maroon, beige.

Ugh I painted my office what I was hoping would be a bright but calm blue...it turned out Carolina Blue and I REALLY don't like it....but that room will one day be a nursery and somehow I would be ok with the blue in that case....until then.

When I moved into my apartment, my bathroom (yes, the bathroom) was painted DARK YELLOW. Like the crayon Maize. The connotations were just awful, and did I mention they never finished it? The outside wall was a nasty maroon gloss.

This was in a loft.

lime green...blech!

What's so bad about super white? I've got a loft where some spaces are warm and some cool. The super bright white (Behr) keeps the whole place feeling clean and modern while also being able to reflect the colors of the various spaces and various times of day without clashing.

In any case, anything it better than the various shades of "band-aid" color most of the place was when I moved in.

I like the realtor's point. If you love colour or care about colour, you won't want beige. But if you don't care, you just want something to "go with" what you got, hence, beige.

magnolia. I lived in a room with magnolia weatherboards for 2 years its just.....nothing.

I do agree in theory about pepto pink walls, and generally about lime green...
HOWEVER -
- I moved into an apartment in Chicago where the previous tenant of 50 years had painted the large living room pepto pink (left the working fireplace mantel white, and large beams on the ceiling dark wood). It was fabulous, so I kept it.
- I had a awful apartment in Seattle where the living room received very little sunlight. I painted some of the walls a bright yellowish green (not unlike the bottom green in the photo), which really perked the room (and myself) up!

haha... I think every color I've painted a wall, have helped someone paint, or am currently considering painting rooms and walls in my new apartment has been listed: teal (loved it as an ascent wall to a Indian themed room), a light kelly green (my favorite color) as a back-splash to white kitchen cabinets; chocolate brown; butter yellow; red; and various shades of blues and greens. Each to his own.

There are no ugly colors , just ugly color combinations.

But I really, really, really despise anything pink.

Curtis ... ccs was being sarcastic. Crayola hasn't had the "flesh" colored crayon since the 80's. Lets get with the times here.

I have flesh colored flesh... *sigh* It's not a pretty color.

Growing up I hated the "white" thumbalina (or something) doll, but I loved my darked skin one. It looked so much more normal. The white one creeped me out.

I hate Coral/salmon. Even on flowers in a garden. I like red, orange and pink, but not coral. (brights in the garden, pales on the walls.)

I have not yet found a pink that I really want on the walls.

I hate pepto bismal/ bubblegum pink too. A local coffee shop recently painted their entire women's washroom bubblegum pink and it looks atrocious.

I'm not at all fond of turquoise/aqua. Those not quite green & not quite blue colors. It kinda makes me angry.
There's a house I drive by every day that was just painted bright yellow w/bright red trim. So ketchup & mustard. So McDonald's!

I didn't read all the way through but 'FLESH' color??? thats objectionable, really. Crayola stopped using that name for obvious reasons.

I had a tenant that painted the living room a shocking, almost caution cone, shade of orange. Which would have almost been okay if they hadn't used beige trim(over might I add the 100 year old molding and trim I lovingly stripped and stained) It was truly stomach churning. I did use a kelly green in the kid's playroom and it looks quite nice actually, the girls chose what they wanted and I'm pleased with the results. http://www.flickr.com/photos/21759161@N04/2395390941/
It's a bit of a mess, but hey it's a playroom what can you do

Cheap paint looks bad in any color. That's why rental beige and white is so awful. Bright and deep colors should be reserved for accent walls in a modern space.

Circus-peanut orange is hard to live with. There's some of that where I work, all the doors. It's not peach. In some of the spots where it is peeling, it is green the color of a box of apple jacks. I don't like teal things, usually. I think my apartment walls (and the interior office walls at work) are the color of pancake batter, but I never minded it until apparently finding out some people find it hideous. Maybe it's not, though. It's a pale buttery creamy color. I didn't choose it, is that how it works? I also don't like maroon colors, esp. maroon and hunter green. The halls at my apartment building were recently painted a caramel color that's pretty gross, like it was left over and so they didn't have to think what color paint would be bright enough - it frankly looks like a crummier building now.

And still, I wouldn't react initially to the bad colors if they were well-played. The colors aren't "bad", it's the amounts, combinations, contexts, and overuse/staleness, and whether or not the element of design and proportion are evident in the space with it.

Not a big fan of most mustard yellows or maroons. Though I do think the dark reds in that Aura photo are pretty nice.

Here's one for the "peachy/fleshy" under dog. In a 1950s very long rectangular den with red broken brick floors and very little natural light coming in, Colonial Revival Tan at 25% of formula (Sherwin Williams exterior color) looked incredible. It picked up the 1950s vibe and made our artwork really pop (even black and white photos). I tested it in the hallway of our new house - 1912 four-square with tons of light - and it looked AWFUL. But if you have a musty feeling dark room - check it out.

I agree with the pinks and beiges - blech! I also can't stand orange (terra cotta is about the orange-iest I will do - did it once in fact, though it was my husband's idea. Never quite fell in love with it, but it did grow on me a little after awhile, if the light was right). Teal and aquamarine are two more yucky wall colors for me. Any shade of yellow as well.

I love cranberry and chocolate as accent walls when paired with a lighter color. An entire room in those colors seems too cave-like for me, though. Tans are nice too, as long as they aren't beigey. Some shades of light, muted blues and greens are pretty, but dark blues and greens are awful.

I also despise pinky/beigey bandaid colors, yet the few times I've tried to paint my walls something 'neutral' I've ended up with exactly that on my walls and had to repaint immediately because I couldn't function. Which is why I keep my wall colors nice and bright and that's that. I can handle picking out aqua blue. I can't handle the neutral thing. (Although I know my decorating style isn't most people's bag).

I would normally never use pink on a wall but when I decided to put up vinyl art in my hallway the only color that I could picture it working with was a deep hot pink. It turned out so good I wanted to lick the wall when I was done. I LOVE LOVE LOVE the color.
I think the reason it works is because it's on 1 small wall. More than that would have been too much. But that exp has taught me never say never!

(the color was 'sputnik' from Beckers, but they make shitty paint so we took the swatch to Alcro. Their paint amazing, thick as sour scream, covers in one coat and looks good enought o eat)

The worst for me is what I call "Ace Bandage Tan." Gross. It's the color everyone's parents used in the 70s so it would "go with everything."

I can't stand "country colors" -- faded reds, "Williamsburg" blues, yellowed off-whites and greyed out yellows that have that sun-faded look. Colors that go with a red and white checkered couch and wooden geese on the mantle. I think it's some kind of reaction against growing up in the south.

My friend painted her open, airy living room Denver Bronco orange. With her spare decoration and brown leather furniture it looked spectacular! Who woulda thunk.....

Am I the only one who feels irritated when entering a room that has yellow walls? I know it is used to brighten up a space, but I find it really jarring, especially in small spaces, such as bathrooms. And I don't have anything against yellow as a color---yellow used as accents is wonderful.

color is so personal, and it really depends on what you are putting in the space.

when we painted our living room green we woke up the next day walked in and thought "holy shit what did we do?"

but then we put out stuff in there and it looked so good. i commend anyone who tries something different because there is nothing i hate more the beige.. beige.. beige.

people who are scared of regretting what colors they choose pick beige. but ANY color is better then that.

I tend to paint seasonally and with aura and no primer its even easier. I love the new Pottery Barn Sping colors

http://www.myperfectcolor.com/Benjamin-Moore-Pottery-Barn-Paint-Colors-Spring-2008-MPC-s/3408.htm

It is very hard to brush Aura but eaiser then ever with a 1/4" nap roller

Mint green. WORST color ever for interiors, unless you want your place to feel like a psych ward....

My sister-in-law actually paid a color consultant who suggested the color combination of (wait for it...) hot pink and turquoise for her sewing room/den -- and she actually went for it.

When you walk in that room, it's like Barbie lives there. The couch is turquoise, the curtains are hot pink, the desk is hot pink with turquoise drawers. Babies cry and puppies die when you walk into that room...

Color is indeed contextual. I went against the mantra of using soothing colors for the bedroom. I painted mine orange coral and it looks fabulous. Always gives me a good feeling before going to bed and waking up in the morning.

Generally I don't go for colors that cast a ghastly tone on our complexion. Also like the Benjamin Moore Historical colors- they have chameleon-like qualities. Tones change depending on the amount of sunlight.

Yellow:
http://www.bhg.com/decorating/color/colors/yellow-home-decorating-ideas/?page=5

And this is totally a Small, Cool headboard idea, I bet you could use seat cushions and simple board, it's yellow, choose your own color:
http://www.bhg.com/decorating/room/bedroom/neutral-bedroom-colors/?page=8

Hot bright pink:
http://www.bhg.com/decorating/color/colors/pink-home-decorating-ideas/?page=15

Couldn't find the right purple, but here's lavender:
http://www.bhg.com/decorating/color/colors/purple-home-decorating-ideas/?page=2

Another lavender:
http://www.bhg.com/decorating/color/colors/simply-perfect-color-schemes/?page=4

Green, in what appears to be a guest cottage/studio:
http://www.bhg.com/decorating/color/colors/green-home-decorating-ideas/?page=5

Intense key lime kitchen:
http://www.bhg.com/decorating/color/colors/green-home-decorating-ideas/?page=9

I have NO idea what color "Tenement Hall Beige" is. But here are a couple of images of a dining area with beige walls, white trim:
http://www.bhg.com/decorating/color/neutrals/neutral-color-home-decorating-pictures/?page=4
http://www.bhg.com/decorating/color/neutrals/neutral-color-home-decorating-pictures/?page=5

There's nothing wrong with beiges:
http://www.bhg.com/decorating/room/bedroom/neutral-bedroom-colors/

I can see the Hollywood Regency fans going nuts over this headboard treatment:
http://www.bhg.com/decorating/room/bedroom/neutral-bedroom-colors/?page=3

White? Why not white? This bed looks like a cloud:
http://www.bhg.com/decorating/room/bedroom/neutral-bedroom-colors/?page=14

And here, you see whites all over:
http://www.bhg.com/decorating/seasonal/summer/decorating-with-summer-whites/

Another Small, Cool idea, courtesy the color White:
http://www.bhg.com/decorating/seasonal/summer/decorating-with-summer-whites/?page=6

This room I adore, and it has beige and white! (use interactive arrows to see whole room):
http://www.bhg.com/app/decoratinggallery/item.jsp?itemid=/templatedata/bhg/dg-room/data/LR_modernvintagelivingroom_12052003.xml

And where would black be, without white?:
http://www.bhg.com/decorating/color/neutrals/decorating-in-black-and-white/?page=5

White looks so good with black and gray:
http://www.bhg.com/decorating/color/neutrals/decorating-in-black-and-white/?page=10

So, Mark, any other colors???

So true. No bad colors or color combinations, really. I have successfully worked baby pink, fuschia, orange, and lime into a color scheme. But as one who deals in color choices, I can tell you that it's always a crap shoot. Most people choose a paint chip and think that's the process. But it takes a lot of tweak-&-refine-time to get the color combination's tones, temperatures, and weights just right. Usually when a color scheme bothers someone, it's those imbalances that are the real problem. And when it's done perfectly, you barely even notice the color.

Colors are not bad! It's the people who present them in a bad way. I love all colors!!! I think it really depends on the space, light, mood, furnishings etc....

Found a great video demonstrating Benjamin Moore Aura covering black magic marker in 1 coat with a deep red.

Benjamin Moore
Aura Paint
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nBofv-r1TLQ

i think it does depend on context... we painted many of the walls in our house shades of off white to deep creams and they look great contrasted with the pure white baseboards. But then we painted the bathroom the same off white colour and because the tiles in there had a grey undertone it looked awful! truly bad... we ended up repainting it grey and now it looks so much better.

people are saying they hate beige - but if you have a lot of colourful art (which we do) and something crisp white to contrast it (like nice big baseboards) it can make a great grounding element in the room.

In defense of salmon, I've seen *gorgeous* 19th-century New Orleans interiors painted salmon, mixed with antiques. The trick to this color is that it only works in certain climates. It's great in the sub-tropics, but probably not in, say, Chicago.

Flesh is an English word, dating back to the 12th century. Obviously when it was introduced there was a much smaller range or skin tones people were familiar with in everyday life.

I don't see the hold over of color connotation as such a big deal. But I'm a word geek and always think in terms of time and place of word origin to the meaning of the word.

I had no idea so many people were so offended by flesh as a color descriptor.

i think there can be bad colors in certain contexts.
here in vancouver a lot of the new monster homes are painted in salmon, coral, or peachy-beige. given the amount of rain and mold we accumulate year round, the houses look absolutely horrible: moldy, greenish, dirty and blotchy. ugh

I'm with you, Slim. And using "bandaid" is only covering up the assumptions--Why, after all, are bandaids the color they are?

Of course there is ethnocentricism built in to the language. But, has any one come up with a word that denotes the same color in the same way?

Any colour you hate can be done well. Every colour that makes you wince in disgust is someone else's favourite ever. Even I can acknowledge this, and I am VERY picky about my colours - for instance, I hate really dark greens. I think they look grim and dark and dank. And yet, I've seen some AMAZING interiors that use dark green!

My old room was bright sunshiney yellow, and it made me smile every time I walked in. My current room has a warm purple on three of the walls, and pale yellow on the fourth (admittedly, I would very much prefer that it was a brighter, stronger colour, but that's personal preference and it looks pretty good as it is). I think they looked fabulous!

The only wall colours that bug me are when people want to use stronger, bolder colours, but get freaked out and do a really washed-out version at the last minute. I managed to convince my Mum that the living room could take a stronger yellow, but she wussed out at the last moment and now it's barely discernable from cream. And since it's a big room, it just looks... bland.

I agree that there are no inherent "ugly colors" and that colors are all within context. They are tied to culture, current trends, and experience. It seems from the commenters that many people, self included, are freaked out by anything resembling flesh-tone. (BTW on that argument, when I think of 'flesh', I think dull pinky-peach, not the color of my own beautiful deep brown skin. Come on it's just a term!) I happen to have an aversion to what I consider hospital colors- faded blue or green. They depress me. I'm also anti-mauve. For some strange reason, everyone who buys a house in the suburbs paints their dining room that reddish burgundy color. What's up with that?

Any dark color ...dark burgundy, forest green, navy...or bright carribbean color...red, pink, teal...painted in a gloss finish. You have to have perfect walls and an impeccable lighting plan to pull off any of these schemes in a gloss color, and even then its risky.

also colors that are almost white but not quite...almost white blue, almost white green...looks like you just got your paintbrush dirty

There are no bad colors - Context is everything -

Those Pink Bubble Gum, Batter Yellow, Purple and Peach colors that you loathe so much at home are perfect for a cabana on the beach in Mexico or a bar in the Caribbean.

Superwhite is perfect for a Minimalist loft or a garage.

Kelly Green is perfect when it's painted on the door of an Irish Pub.

Even Landlord Beige can be a great choice in a room full of architectural detail and decorated in complimentary neutrals.

1. "Flesh" is the color of raw chicken meat (or chicken flesh, if you will). In winter my skin, sadly, comes close. But we can't ALL be lovely shades of brown. (I agree with Aiekan, it's only a word -- be offended by poor treatment of people not color names...)

2. Aura paint is WONDERFUL, but you should use their brand-specific rollers and brushes for the best effect with it.

3. I agree that there are no bad colors, just bad color combinations and applications. But in my house, there will NEVER be pink of any shade (except in teensy doses most likely in flowers) nor any traditional pastels (bad childhood memories.) I rather like the effect of very dark colors offset by metals and crystal, but I don't live that lifestyle. There are good beiges and bad ones -- cafe au lait versions are often rather nice. In small accent doses, with the right base, just about anything can be gorgeous, though.

This is hilarious about the Pancake Batter Yellow!
I just bought a new home, and the previous owner had everything FLESH-TONED!!

When I found the extra paint in the closet, it was called "Belgian Waffle"!

I've painted 4 gallons of trim paint (white, of course)

Check out the befores here:
http://stitchriprepeat.blogspot.com/2009/04/befores-and-one-almost-after.html

teal

For me it's more the combos than the colors. If you're using saturated colors, please, please, please don't mix them like the Simpsons. Hello headache.

Peptol bismol pink.
Yuck.
Almost every classroom at my community college had one wall painted this color. It was especially horrible when a professor had all the desks facing that pink wall. It made it very hard for me to concentrate... I was sitting there wondering why on earth that color was chosen instead of focusing on my schoolwork. :S Sooo distracting and hideous.

Puce.

Anything pastel that isn't shaded with a bit of black.

Regarding Benajamin Moore Aura... it is truly awesome. In our kitchen, we painted over bright Kelly Green high-gloss paint with rather pale Gossamer Blue, matte, in ONE coat, no kidding.

"Puce."

And what's WRONG with Muriel Puce???
;-)

browns with a lot of yellow = baby poo
mauves or greyed purples = living in a varicose vein
pinky flesh tones - reminds me of barbies. i hate barbies.

At the moment I can't stand off whites, beige and all brownish colors. I'm real fan of pretty white walls and bringing any color/s with furniture, fabrics and accessories.

In my recent brand new rented apartment I have dark brown kitchen cabinets, brown baseboards and doors, black-brown concrete floors, brown and beige batrooms, beige carpet in the bedrooms, eggshell wall color with olive-green accent wall(scary)...but everything is new, close to shopping area and nice floorplan.

Oooh, forgot - all the apartment's doors are pretty shades of green, blue, yellow and orange, very urban setting but when you open the door enter sad brown world.

For me, Peach or coral. I like most other colors, I don't even have a favorite. :)

Dark blue curtains were a mistake for me.

Ban the beige!

Other than that I personally find yellow is an incredibly difficult colour as it looks different under natural, fluorescent and tungsten lights, so it's really hard to find one that's nice in the shop and on the street outside the shop and in your house at night.

BRIGHT ROYAL BLUE!
I HATE COLORED CEILINGS! http://www.apartmenttherapy.com/chicago/kitchen/house-fausto-home-and-ceramic-studio-083068

I nominate MY NYC apartment hallway for the worst colors, and combination thereof. An 80s renovation gone bad: Flesh with mauve trim. Or, is it mauve with flesh trim?

I happen to have a picture of the hallway because I took snaps of all of my stuff before placing into a storage facility. See pic:
http://picasaweb.google.com/nslome/BadBadColors#5340276490984190994

Amazing that the hallways are so ugly when the lobby is really quite nicely appointed (e.g., granite, white trim, grey walls, dark woods).

"be offended by poor treatment of people not color names..."

I'll thank you not to tell me what I can and cannot be offended by. One way to treat people poorly is to ignore them when they say that what you're saying is hurtful. Sure, it's not a big giant world injustice...but why bring more hurt into the world if you don't have to?

I was about to say that I've never met a color I could not, in context, love--but then someone said puce. What an awful color. I even hate the name. Puce puce puce, bleh.

I just feel like mentioning the stairwell of my apartment actually looks a lot like the picture accompanying this post. Someone sometime in the 70s started painting it but for whatever reason kept changing their mind(?) or something and for the last 30 years it's been patches of brown, white, eggplant, lilac, fuchsia, green and teal with spots of beige on top and similarly multicoloured trim. I'm strangely fond if it actually.

Worst color ever on a wall. I had the bright idea to do a venetian plaster treatment on my dining room walls. I chose a brown. Well, that brown had a good bit of green/yellow in it. What looked sophisticated on the color swatch was awful in reality. It looked like someone had smeared goose poop all over my walls. Luckily, I was able to paint over it and ended up with something close to the texture I'd been going for, but in a not poop color.

The color of that hideous fleshy pink/beige cheap carpeting that is mandated for all new studio apartments.

Low ceilings painted with the same paint as the walls. In semi-gloss.

Anything that purports to 'hide dirt'.

Tonight I was eating red pepper hummus, thinking it looks a lot like that color that has been referred to as "flesh" or "bandaid" in earlier posts. Definitely not a color I'd want on my wall. So that's my least favorite..."roasted red pepper hummus".

Mint green is a close second. Ew.

I'll say salmon is my absolute most hated color, followed by bubble gum pink, any shade of mauve, and hot red painted on four walls (nothing against hints of reds).

I almost bought a house that had the most awful color combo ever:
- interior like an unfinished Alpen chalet (no mountain in a 200 km radius)
- first kid's room painted maroon and navy blue (you really can't imagine how dark and womit-inducing it looks)
- second kid's room painted a very bright blue, with yellow spills done by toothbrush everywhere (ceiling included, that was hard work for something this awful), except for a large area where the teenage did a tattoo-like painting.
- The teenage actually painted tags on every exterior and garage wall.

My husband and I are currently living in the home where he grew up, with his family (was supposed to be "temporarily" but it's looking like "for the next half a year at least"). His old bedroom is now our computer room, and while the colours of dark-green and dark-blue on the walls (with dark-blue blinds, and the desk and wardrobe also painted dark-blue!) might have been nice to sleep by, they are absolutely IMPOSSIBLE to work in. Everything is too dark, this room cannot be lit properly. It EATS LIGHT for breakfast, lunch and dinner! HE thinks it's all perfectly fine, and he's so attached to his room, he refuses to even consider the idea of re-painting the walls, because it's his old bedroom and they're his favourite colours.

So those are currently my most hated colours, because I have to live with them and work in them for at least the rest of this year...

Perhaps I stand alone in this bias, but if I see one more red dining room, I'm going to run amok. I especially hate a red dining rooms that are plopped into homes that have nothing to do with red in the rest of their decor. What IS it with people and red dining rooms?

Agree with comments about color and context. A salmon-colored tenement hallway--probably replete with fluorescent lighting--would be a nightmare from hell: a salmon-colored sitting room or library with oriental rugs, antiques and gold-framed pictures on the walls, rich woods, and rich fabrics on the furniture could be delicious.

Well apparently, bepsf, she has the I.Q. of a dead flashlight battery.

There are some colors that are listed here that i wouldn't paint an entire wall with, but sometimes can be used as accent colors or trim colors.

But these are the colors I would never paint with... ever:
Hunter green
Burgundy
yellow (most shades)
lime green
purple (any shade)
peach/corral/pinkish hues
Bright orange

Deep jewel tones aren't my fave. Just helped my sister paint her rental: walls and even one ceiling in hunter green. Alternating walls were a very ugly plum shade. Ugh. Dark and depressing. We painted the master Latte, the teen daughter's room Surfer (tourquoise) with a Daffodil accent wall, and the boys' room Notable Hue (a greyish medium blue). Colors were Sherwin Williams' Pro-Green eg-shell, and I had to prime with like color first to cover the awful dark walls. I liked all of them, and worked with the personalities of each. All trim and ceilings are white.

I also painted an entire interior Nomadic Desert, white trim. Looks great. It's kind of a warm brownish tan.

My very favorite color so far is SW's Afternoon. An orangey-yellow, so cheerful I smile every time I go in the bedroom. It's in the spare room where my granddaugter's crib is, and a twin white iron bed. So cute, very fresh. Brighter than I've ever gone. Pale yellow is kind of blah, but this deeper shade is warm, beautiful.

Hard to do a lot of bright colors in this part of the midwest. I don't want to re-paint it all to sell in a few years.

Aimi, that house sounds like a nightmare! I would have had to get an estimate on paint and carpet, had the seller agree to pay to have this done before I moved in. I agree, it's tough to see past such hideous presentations.

The conference room (no windows, fluorescent lighting, low ceiling, kinda sad) was painted with a free paint. Which was the exact color of doll flesh. A peachy, pinkish flesh tone. It is hoorrriiid. Makes you feel like you are encased in a cocoon. Of doll flesh.

I would like to ask the people who support the idea of using the word 'flesh' as a color a few questions.

1. Are you white? (I'm going to go ahead and answer "yes" for you.)

2. Do you think people are being too sensitive in their responses to the use of 'flesh' as a color name? Have you considered the alternative possibility that you are actually being insensitive?

Thank you, that is all.

I find it interesting that even though flesh comes in all different colors, people (white or otherwise) automatically assume that it is describing white skin in this context.

How about we all agree that the word "flesh" is kind of ugly and gross sounding anyway and just not use it. I don't care what color it is, nobody is going to paint their walls something called flesh. *gag*

It's just paint, people.

When I think of the word/color flesh, I don't think of skin color, but the color of the fatty tissue under all of our skins. That being said, it is insensitive for people to continue using "flesh" to describe a color that is obviously insulting to others. But anyways...

I generally hate green on walls (sage, mint, leaf). Olive and army greens are tolerable.

On the flip side, I'm obsessed with cream on walls. I've painted the living space in every home I've lived in in the last 8 years mannequin cream by Benjamin Moore. It's the perfect background color for my things. However, I'm thinking in my next apartment, it might be time for a change.

The ugliest paint ever. Ever. Ever. is Sherwin Williams Fun Yellow. It is currently the color in my bedroom. I needed FOUR COATS to cover white and it is STILL disgusting.

May I nominate my house pre- rennovation as death by colour. An oompa-loompa may have died in there...

http://canberrasgotstyle.blogspot.com/2009/04/casa-ribena-in-begining.html

Each room was a different candy shade: four walls and ceiling, with stronger GLOSS trim. We had buttercup yellow, blue, green, pink, purple and the room that made you quickly grab your sunnies (or cry) retina burning blood-red orange with dark blue GLOSS trim.

Needless to say, repainting was an immediate necessity!

I love color and have found that each new painting project requires a deeper saturation to feed my addiction!

Last year I sold a house filled with color, inside and out, thanks to my addiction, in a lousy market no less. It sold for my asking price in less than a month. The buyer repeatedly commented on my harmonious use of color, and I really think it made the sale. Not a single wall was beige!!!

Band-aid? Pepto? Poop?! If the color reminds you of something unpleasant, of course it is the wrong color!

But don't be afraid! The trick to making any color work is harmony, and that's as much science as preference. Get out your color wheels!

my bathroom was originally light yellow above the chair-rail, and a mustardy horrible dijon yellow below the rail and the door. just awful, it was so drab and dark and the upper corners weren't finished so you could see the midnight blue from the previous-previous tenant. i painted to top part white (instantly brighter and made the room feel larger), and then tried pink, and told the guy one color and he picked the color 2 down on the paint strip - so i was floating in bubble-yum bubble-gum for about a month. i covered that with 2 coats of white and then a light cover of teal - the room feels like a beach oasis and so much better.

the kitchen was bright kelly green (almost to the point of highlighter green) and at first it was ok, but after about 6 months i couldn't take it anymore. i painted it a clam cream color, the cabinets are white and it's serene and i used bright green as accents instead. it's so much better now.

the living room was tampon box blue, it's now a light lemony color & with white drapes and bamboo shades - its much lighter (i don't feel pulled down by the room).

the bedroom was supposed to be khaki brown, but for some reason turned dusty rose (AWFUL). i painted the bottom 8 feet a super light purple, and above the plate rail and the ceiling is a medium purple/hydrangea color.

it's so much better.

I hate when moldings/trim that are not still the original wood (or stained) are anything but a white or cream--preferably semigloss. So basically, any paint color on moldings and trim is the wrong color to me.

And along those lines, I totally agree with nkr707 about colored ceilings.