I Spontaneously Painted My Bathroom at Midnight, and It’s the Best Decision I’ve Made in Forever

I’ve been a serial renter for most of my 20s, moving five times (across three states) before finally settling into a cozy one-bedroom apartment. There’s an overwhelming sense of possibility that comes with entering adulthood, and I spent the last decade going through many different “eras” trying to find the right lifestyle (and design style!) for me. 

Knowing my living situation and tastes were likely to change, I developed a practical but somewhat limiting design habit over the years. My furniture, decor, and even most-prized antique finds were all neutral colors.  

A commonly preached nugget of design advice, sticking with neutrals for my large and more expensive pieces served me well, at first. Neutral colors were almost always guaranteed to work with the varying shades of “renter beige” during my years of apartment hopping, and they were also versatile enough to keep with me through my mid-century modern, French country, and Brutalist design phases.

Now that I’ve entered my 30s, explored the world a bit, and lived in my current apartment for three years, I finally felt like I understood my own aesthetic enough to commit to a color palette. And that’s why I painted my bathroom green, and I’m never looking back. 

When I first saw Paloma Elsesser’s home in the February issue of Architectural Digest, the bathroom stopped me in my tracks. Much like the supermodel’s Brooklyn townhouse, my historic Beacon Hill apartment in Boston also has checkered floors, and I loved the way the honeydew melon meets celery green wall color she used plays up the space’s vintage roots. I decided right then to go with a soft shade of yellowish-green for my bathroom walls. 

Sage green has had a steady grip on design for the past few years, and I like to think of celery as its cool cousin. Because greens are colors found in nature, in many cases these hues still read as a neutral and pair well with just about anything, including classic black and white, darker and lighter woods, and even red (hello, complementary colors!). I ultimately landed on Benjamin Moore’s Chameleon (526) for my bathroom walls.

I started the project on a whim at midnight one night, and in a few hours, I had celery colored green walls. I only wish I had taken the DIY on sooner, since the payoff was immediate. 

Designers will tell you that trying colors in smaller, contained spaces makes the decision-making process feel less risky and high-stakes. If I didn’t love my choice of celery green for my bathroom walls, repainting them takes a lot less time, money, and energy to cover up than, say, my living room walls. 

My bathroom also doesn’t have any windows, which means there’s less light variation for me to consider when swatching and searching for a just-right shade. I was able to arrive at a match pretty easily by swatching just a few colors, which you can see above. Benjamin Moore’s Warren Acres (527) was a contender, but I was sold that Chameleon got its name because the color, according to Benjamin Moore’s description, adapts well to any setting, even windowless ones.

There’s just something about this color that feels so ripe for spring, but it’s a year-round stunner, too. The shade has completely perked up my walls and maybe even brightened the room a bit, considering the former sad-beige paint was dull and a little bit dingy. Being enveloped in this soft shade makes me feel immediately calm, especially curled up in the bath with a good book. 

I just love the way my new green bathroom backdrop mellows out all of the existing black-and-white in the space (remember, I was a neutrals gal!), and yet, it seems to play up more punchy colors like deep reds. It gave me the confidence to introduce cranberry as an accent color, and I incorporated that in the form of a moody candle and my favorite florals, calla lilies. I’m all about the playful juxtaposition of this final look and think I’ll definitely continue dipping my toes into more color in the future.