Gone are the days of the four white walls. The fact is, painting a room's walls is one of the quickest, simplest and most affordable ways to refresh its look or extend a decor theme. Employ a modern technique for painting your walls to make your home look up-to-date. Start small by repainting a bathroom wall or the trim around doors and windows, then work your way up to a larger painting project.
New Neutrals
For people fearful of straying too far from the white wall look, new neutrals serve as a happy compromise. Do not settle for white when eggshell adds texture and dimension to the walls, especially in a midcentury modern decor. Gray offers another option. Go for rose-tone grays in rooms that need more light and warmth, and blue-based grays in rooms that benefit from a cool sophistication. Cheerful yellow remains a favorite neutral, be it in mellow shades that serve as a backdrop, sunny brights that open up a room, or mustard tones that channel French country farmhouses.
Accent Walls
Accent walls add visual pop to plain-Jane rooms. Give your kitchen retro '50s cool with an aqua wall and cotton candy pink on the trim. Bring India to a bedroom with poppy orange and fuchsia. Mottled blues and greens lend a bohemian modern aesthetic, while icy pink, pale lavender, pistachio and faded cornflower say shabby chic. The Asian fusion and eco-design trends have popularized faded earth tones, pale greens and creamy whites. Faux finishes work well on accent walls, too. Try an antiquing or crackle painting kit from a craft store to give a wall a distressed and weathered look.
Murals
One modern wall-painting technique makes the walls a focal point: Murals, be they packaged elements or completely hand-painted, transform a room. Many do-it-yourself projects feature wall murals of nature scenes in silhouette, such as dark outlines of trees, branches, blades of grass, flowers, owls and birds. A mural can create a basic backdrop, such as a pattern of alternating blues that evokes ocean waves, or feature bold graphics, such as a faux brick finish with spray paint and cartoon art. One quick way to add a mural is to paint a basic backdrop and add vinyl wall stickers or stencils as the trim or central images.
