A lot of people write and ask me about mixing undertones in a room and which beige undertones work well together in a room to create that unified, cohesive ‘pulled together’ look.
Here is a letter I wanted to share with you regarding this confusion that I received from a designer friend who wrote, “What are the combinations that you DO want to put together? For instance, one client I have right now has a very orangey-wood furniture in her dining room.
The pink beiges look terrible with it. So I know they’re wrong. But when you have orangey or yellow colors, you’re supposed to use yellow undertones?
I.e. are you supposed to match the undertones in the different elements in the room?
What about the complement – in this case, the nearest thing to a complement of the orangey color would be green. So would green undertones work with it?”
I know it can be confusing so I wanted to give you a few simple guidelines that I use when working with mixing beige undertones.
Rule # 1- Beige has either pink/red, green, yellow or orange undertones. As I explained in this post here, the best advice I can give you when trying to determine an undertone of a color is to compare them together. Put your beige samples right up next to each other to help you see the differences between them.
Pink/Red Undertones Huntington Beige Green Undertones
Yellow undertones Boardwalk – Orange Undertones
Rule # 2- When you are working with beige undertones- keep it in the beige family. Do not worry about the complement color or the color undertones of other colors such as gray, green or blue. This is something that seems to confuse people. Just think of the undertones of the beige you are working with.
Rule # 3- Know which undertones to mix to create a unified room. To create the best put together, coordinated look when mixing undertones is to keep the red undertones with red undertones, yellow with yellow, green with green and orange with orange undertones.
So my answer in deciding which wall color would work best, was for her to first look for the dominating beige undertone in the room, which in her case was the very orangey-wood furniture:
Then pull out your orangey beige color samples which will give this room that complete, harmonious look by keeping the orange undertone of the walls together with the strong orange undertones of the existing furniture.
BM Golden Mist Orange Undertones
Just remember to use the same beige undertones throughout the room to avoid mixing the wrong undertones together.
Hope this helps you understand those tricky beige undertones a little better. Thoughts?
If you need help selecting paint colors for your home, contact me today.
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Kelly Bernier Designs
Appreciate the recommendation. Let me try it out.
Hi Lauren,
The question was how to mix beige undertones. If they want to downplay something in the room that is a whole different subject. Thanks for writing!
Hi Kristie,
I wrote this particular blog answering a question many people are confused with- mixing which beige undertones together to work cohesively in a room. Red with yellow? Orange with red? Red with red?
If I was asked ” what can I do with my red undertones that I HATE”, I would have them look at other blogs I have written such as “Other Color Options for Pinky Beige” or “How to Update Your Brown Furnishings’ etc.
I would never suggest filling a room with a color someone hated just because it had the ‘right’ undertone. That’s silly.
Hi kelly, i am thinking like chridtie. Alot of folkfs are stuvk with somethingbtheybwant to play down and helping them paint their space is sometmes like showing someone how to put foundation on their face.
I would think that a compliment or a split compliment would work, depending on the lighting in the space. Maybe you could demonstrate.
Always enjoybyour posts.
I totally agree. Our former home had yellowy-toned wood floors and trim. The big pieces of furniture (couch/loveseat, etc.) were beige with yellowy undertones.I made throw pillows with yellowy-undetoned browns. It was a beautiful, warm pulled-together room. BTW, the pic you used after Rule #3 is probably my favorite
Kelly,
Good post! However, I must play Devil’s Advocate – what if you HATE the color that has the “right” undertone and now it’s going to be literally everywhere you look?
Nice post, Kelly. Isn’t is a pain just how bossy the beige can be in a room? And apparently it’s a neutral colour
oops correct that to say burnt SIENNA
i assume this works for wood floor also?? MY floors are solid banglok teak in a natural finish… very orange/burnt sepia. the original finish was a darker stain but still orangish and our white walls were actually “orange in white.” nothing else looked right. Now with the natural finish I am inclined to stick to white walls but a different white… as I like max contrast and really do not want beige, orange etc walls…. i guess we need to use some splashes of orange here and there as it really makes the room look “right.” Let me add that the floors are parquet…( read busy) so they really are very busy…but want to make them an asset, not pretend they are not there. I do like LOTS of white and bold splashed of intense color ( the floor NEEDS intense) like magenta, orange, turquoise, even brilliant sapphire blue in small doses….. the room gets cool light so need to have the color balance lean towards warm but still have spots of the cool tones. i like yellow too…oh dear