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April 29, 2007
Paint it Neutral
When B. and I bought our house eight years ago, the first thing we did - before we moved any furniture into the house, even - was paint. It wasn't just about freshening up the new place; it was eradicating our new home of every single bit of eggshell off-white. We hate eggshell off-white. Do I strike you as an eggshell off-white type? Of course not, because I'm not.
If you've ever taken a glance at my Flickr account, you've undoubtedly noticed just how not eggshell off-white our house is. There's the dark purple dining room/office, the kicky red kitchen, the blood-splattered red nightmare bedroom, and my character-filled vintage aquamarine living room. I love it all. Well, except for the blood-splattered bedroom. I got tired of it during the early days of this millinium, but it's a pain to move the bedroom furniture out and repaint.
But alas, it's all coming to an end. Our current real estate agent keeps encouraging us to "neutralize", which sounds a whole lot like "neuter". I swore that I wouldn't be like the idiots on Sell This House who get all, "But I can't remove my collection of 457 moldy old teddy bears from the entryway! Otherwise my house won't communicate who I am as a person!" Shut it and start shoving bears in a Hefty bag, Dumbass. This isn't about self-expression; it's about ditching your mite-filled crapshack. I swore that I wouldn't get sentimental about making changes to this house because it would mean we'd be that much closer to a great new house, where we'd have even more opportunities for self-expression.
And yet, this neutralizing the walls business hurts a bit.
At the start of the day the room looked a bit like this:
Purple walls, black and white photos of the Gateway Arch I took a few years ago, surrounded by gothy candles sconces, all contrasted with bright white woodwork and a wallfull of windows.
I remember the night we painted the dining room Grape Ape Purple. It was Halloween, 2002, back in those pre-parenthood days when two gallons of dark purple paint seems like a reasonable impulse purchase. I was throwing a party two days later and decided I was tired of the monochromatic teals (still visible in the hall at right) and simply must have a purple dining room to make the party really swing. B. and I spent the evening painting the room in a candy-fueled frenzy. And it was worth it. That party was a great one that included a 12-year-old boy kicking the asses of a bunch of drunk engineers at Jenga.
Around 3:30 this afternoon, my Grape Ape walls were transforming into Sugar Wafer:
I didn't cry, although I almost did on Friday when I bought the paint. The guy mixing it asked what I was painting with two gallons of Sugar Wafer. I slobbered all over his counter about how we're trying to sell our house and in doing so I have to sacrifice my beautiful colors that express who I am so well and you might as well just cut off my ponytails, take away my red lipstick, and permanently break my blog while you're violating my rights of self-expression, you imagination-free troglodytes.
By dinnertime, every muscle in my back hurt and I had this:
I don't think "Sugar Wafer" aptly describes this shade of non-color. I think a better name would be "Drunk Tank Cream". I mean, just look at it. If this color was on cinder block walls, it would scream, "government-run institution!".
I know it actually looks decent. It's got that fresh paint clean thing working for it. And I'll admit, we were long overdue for a new coat. That little hallway hasn't been painted since we moved in and I've never been happy with it. But this is just one small hallway and part of a room. If all goes according to plan, the rest of the dining room, our bedroom, and the living room will be Drunk Tank Cream by the end of the week. The red kitchen stays.
$40 in paint, hours of sweat equity, and damage to my psyche. This better do the trick.
Posted by Robin at April 29, 2007 08:31 PM
Comments
I'm bummed that the great colors are going, but I'm crossing my fingers that it helps in the end...
Posted by: Exena at April 29, 2007 09:53 PM
Holy shit, I hope that helps sell it or those sugar wafer walls might be blood splattered, too, but with real blood.
Posted by: Wendy at April 29, 2007 10:20 PM
You have to buck up and do what it takes, sister. We had to paint over all of our beautiful colors too, but hey - you have a whole new fresh house just begging you to tag it with your self expression!
Posted by: Big Daddy B at April 30, 2007 07:10 AM
I feel for you on the colored walls. There's not a single white wall in my house either! Here's hoping it does the trick for you.
Posted by: Andrea at April 30, 2007 10:02 AM
You can always look ahead to moving into a sugar cream wafer walled house and turning it interesting. The first thing we did in this house was paint the kitchen creamsicle orange :)
Love the purple ;)
Posted by: Eden at April 30, 2007 10:18 AM
So that's what that color is called... I'm workin' hard on My Hunny; every wall of his house is "Drunk Tank Cream," well, except the one with the flowery orange 70's wallpaper; but I'm thinkin' it can stay.
I can't wait to see your bold colors turn up in a new house!!
Posted by: Debbie at April 30, 2007 10:37 AM
I had to repaint all the baseboards, the kitchen cabinets and the hallway when we had our house for sell. Somebody bitched that I hadn't done enough to make the house presentable. Like hell. So I started painting, someone drove by one night, I went out to meet them, let them walk thru the house, and that was that. They made an offer the next day.
Posted by: Cassie at April 30, 2007 11:09 AM
Hopefully the degree of non color in your house will be inversely proportional to the time you have remaining to live in it. Or something.
I don't hate the color, honestly. It looks fresh and clean.
Posted by: Julie at April 30, 2007 02:02 PM
Wow! It looks much bigger!
I understand the wanting to hang onto stuff that you should just let go. Remember my blue Mazda Protege? Remember the ode I wrote to it?
I also like the sound of "sugar wafer". It sounds like "sugar cookie" which is one of my favorite things to make and eat.
You deserve a beer.
Posted by: allison at April 30, 2007 05:42 PM
Well, they just showed the house. One of my neighbors informed us that the lookers stayed for quite some time. We shall see if our half Sugar Wafer/half Grape Ape dining room appealled to them.
I fully admit that the Sugar Wafer does make the house look bigger, and it does have a fresh, clean quality about it. Looks just like an undecorated sugar cookie, too.
Allison, this is all your fault. Why aren't you over here with beer, paint rollers, and free labor? This was my post-painting beverage of choice last night. It was worth all the hard work for that.
Posted by: Robin at April 30, 2007 07:37 PM
Well, I guess it's too late now to offer to paint!? If this is really "my" fault, I expect a small commission as part of your design team ;)
Posted by: allison at May 1, 2007 08:50 PM
