Purple for the Dining Room

Since we moved last year, I’ve been gradually redesigning the interior of the new house. One of the things I really wanted to do was to add some bold splashes of color to the walls. Now, you would think that since I work with color every day, this would not be a problem . . .

Actually, it’s been a huge challenge!

I’ve always had neutral walls in my house on the theory that my work is so colorful that I wanted it to be center stage. But this time, I decided to change things up. I painted my dining room a wonderful purple that adds warmth to an otherwise plain room. And my Autumn Forest quilt, with its purples and greens, shows up much better on the purple wall than it did on plain white or ecru! Below the quilt is my Christmas cactus, with buds just getting ready to open. I’ve had this plant almost ten years, and it nearly always blooms with lovely reddish pink flowers from Thanksgiving all the way to Easter. It’s particularly happy with the sun it gets in its new location. There’s another smaller cactus on the table ledge underneath it–I haven’t had that one as long so I’m not sure when it’s going to bloom.

I have a pumpkin accent wall in the living room and a patchwork of color swatches painted on the wall next to it trying to decide what will go on the other walls, plus lots of paint patches on the walls in many of the other rooms in the house. Somehow it’s harder to choose paint colors than fabric, but I’m going to keep at it–so stay tuned!