Ooooohhhhhhh, I just love seeing the latest and greatest!!  I was fortunate enough to be invited to a premiere event for designers at Stark Carpet last week.  Stark was exhibiting their newest wallcovering and carpet designs … but also celebrating the debut of Stark Paint, their new paint collection in collaboration with London-based color expert David Oliver.

I wish Charlotte were home to this showroom …

which is, of course, located in New York City … but for now, we’ll have to settle for this display.

Regardless, Stark Paint is Charlotte’s first super premium source for paint.  Now, I think it’s fair to say that the Charlotte market is dominated by Benjamin Moore and Sherwin-Williams.  Aura – Benjamin Moore’s most expensive product, which I do love – costs approximately $55 per gallon.  Sherwin-William’s premium product, Duration Home, clocks in around $44 per gallon (although it is routinely on sale for somewhere in the neighborhood of $40 per gallon or a bit lower).  Stark Paint, by comparison, costs approximately $59 per gallon.  Farrow & Ball is likely Stark Paint’s closest (albeit more expensive) competitor, but the closest Farrow & Ball retailer is hours away in Atlanta. 

Even at that super premium price point, however, I think Stark Paint is going to do very well.  Stark and David Oliver spent four years developing Stark Paint … and the hard work shows.  The collection includes 240 colors – all of which are gorgeous.  There’s not an “uggghhhh” in the bunch … which makes the process of selecting colors a lot less intimidating for the average consumer.  Stark Paint’s two-booklet system of paint charts is super convenient to carry around – and has the rare benefit of being made of chips that are actually painted rather than digitally reproduced.  How fabulous is that!  I do wish that the paint chips were larger, but I guess that just means I need to invest in the larger paint deck … or start painting my color samples.  On that note, yes, Stark Paint is available in tester pots.  Woo hoo!  I should also mention that the paint is eco-friendly.  Stark Paint – which meets LEEDS standards – is water-based and uses zero VOCs in the paint or in the colorants.  I so appreciate high performance, high quality products that also respect the environment … so two thumbs up there!      

Are you going to try Stark Paint?  If you do, please let me know what you think!

Photos from Interior Design magazine, Stark & Word (Stark Carpet’s blog), and moi. 

Need help selecting colors for your home?  Email me at traci@tracizeller.com to talk about how I can help!

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As I mentioned in an earlier blog post, Molly M. from Charlotte emailed me a while ago with the following question -

Hi Traci,
I read a post you had written about paint color, specifically how the iPhone has an app allowing you to color match by simply taking a picture of a paint color. My question is this... I'm trying to figure out the exact paint and trim color that B.D. Jeffries used in their new Morrison Blvd. store in Charlotte. When I asked, even the store clerks said they didn't know. So, would using this app be the best way to determine this? If not, any advice you could give would be greatly appreciated. Thank you!

After some exhaustive research, here’s my answer to Molly!

Thanks so much for writing, Molly!  I love getting questions from my blog readers, so I really appreciate your email.  Unfortunately, you inadvertently gave a great example of an instance in which the iPhone applications (either Ben Color Capture or Sherwin-Williams Color Snap) really do not work at all!  As anyone who has visited the B.D. Jeffries store in the Shops at Morrison can attest, the main wall color is very unique shade that seems to vary between blue, green and gray depending on the light.  The iPhone applications only work to the extent that the photograph you use in the application accurately represents the color you are trying to achieve.  I found it impossible to take a photograph – either on my iPhone or using a good quality digital camera (and then importing that photo into my iPhone) – that accurately reflected the wall color in a way that would allow either of the iPhone applications to give an accurate color match.  I also tried using my Benjamin Moore Pocket Palette – a portable spectrophotometer (the more sophisticated and non-portable versions of which are used in Lowe’s, Home Depot and every major paint chain to match colors to an existing sample) that has generally given me very accurate results.  As you can imagine, the advantage of the Pocket Palette is that it works directly from the surface of the wall, fabric, or other material.  That means you don’t have to worry about a color being “lost in translation” when photographed.  Interestingly, however, the Pocket Palette did not give me an accurate result either … which meant to me that the B.D. Jeffries wall color was not a standard Benjamin Moore color.  That left three options – that the wall color was custom-mixed by Benjamin Moore, was a standard color from another paint manufacturer/brand, or was custom-mixed by another paint manufacturer/brand.   

Now I was curious … and maybe a teensy bit frustrated.  So I decided to “impersonate” the Designer Detective and see what I could find out.  Let me add here that the “real” Designer Detective is one of my blogger friends Shay Sampson – and she’s just as beautiful in person as her picture – and I highly recommend you add her Designer Detective blog to your must-read list!

At this point, Molly and I emailed back and forth a little more, and she shared with me that the wall color in the previous B.D. Jeffries store – which was located in Phillips Place – was a custom-mixed Duron color.  That piece of information immediately made me think about the Millenium Collection, a wonderful color collection used by Duron years ago and since discontinued.  Now here is where it gets confusing …  Duron sold the Millenium Collection to California Paints … so it became the California Paints Millenium Collection.  California Paints also discontinued the Millenium Collection … so you cannot get sample paint chips anywhere.  If you have a Millenium Collection fan deck (either Duron or California Paints, because they are identical), however, you can ask to have a specific color made.  Of course, the original Duron Millenium Collection was mixed using Duron colorants … which, because Sherwin-Williams acquired Duron – are no longer available.  So, even if you have the color made up – by Duron, California Paints, or any other paint retailer – it may still vary slightly from the “original” Duron version because the colorants used are different.  Whew.  I’m exhausted already.  Still following me??  These facts also mean that the formula for the wall color in the previous B.D. Jeffries store is meaningless, as the “new” Duron has no way to translate a formula using the old colorants to a formula using its current (Sherwin-Williams) colorants.  In other words, to all of those folks who got the paint formula for the previous B.D. Jeffries store (and I know there were a lot of you), I hope you’ve already had it mixed up … because, if you haven’t, you are out of luck. 

Fortunately, I am the proud owner of a California Paints Millenium fan deck … which, now that I own one after seriously a year of perusing eBay, I intend to never let out of my possession!  So I took both of my Benjamin Moore fan decks (Color Preview and Classic Colors), my California Paints Millenium Collection fan deck, and my Sherwin-Williams fan deck to B.D. Jeffries to see what I could come up with. Yes, I’m pretty sure the B.D. Jeffries staff thought I was insane.  I think I was in yoga clothes at this point, so it was hardly an impressive sight. 

OK, to fast-forward this painfully long process just a bit, I had a quart of each of the closest matches made up over at Eastway Paint, painted sample boards (I do them basically like Maria at Colour Me Happy does), and hauled them back to B.D. Jeffries.  At this point, I had nailed the trim color, but I still wasn’t completely satisfied with the wall color.  So I marched myself back to Eastway Paint and asked Frank to tweak my existing colors – making one a little bluer, one a little grayer, and then mixing the two colors 50-50.  I painted sample boards again and went back to B.D. Jeffries.  Fortunately, they still had not called security to deal with the crazy stalker lady.  Ha ha ha!  And, after all of that, finally I was happy.  So here’s the rest of my answer to Molly. 

Molly, the trim color is almost certainly California Paints 8775D, Metal Shavings.  The wall color is still not exact, which might be due to the unavailability of the old Duron colorants.  That being said, I think I’ve gotten really close, so I hope you are happy!  The best approximation of the wall color that I was able to find seems to be California Paints 8613M (Shenandoah) made a little bit grayer by the addition of 1/2 BV.  (Don’t worry, Frank knows what that means.)  Benjamin Moore 472 (Aganthus Green) is also pretty close, so Molly, I’m going to send you all three of these sample boards so you can judge for yourself.  Happy painting … and I’d love to see a photo if you use these colors in your own home!   

Do you have a burning design question?  Email me; I’d love to do more question-and-answer posts.  Heck, I’ll take your non-design questions, too, but no guarantees that you’ll get a high quality answer to those!  Ha ha!   

Photo from the B.D. Jeffries Facebook fan page

Like this post?  Be sure to subscribe to my RSS Feeds!  Or, to view this blog through Facebook, click "Follow this Blog" in the NetworkedBlogs box.  You can also find me on Twitter, @tracizeller, and on Facebook, where my fan page is www.facebook.com/TraciZellerDesigns.  Thanks for reading!

I smell a bad breakup.  And I'm assuming that Lowe's is the jilted lover.  Let me back up for a minute ...

So I went to Lowe's with the Groovy Mom this morning.  We've got some great carpet options for her entirely renovated home from another store in town, but we wanted to make sure we'd done our due diligence and there wasn't anything better for a lower or comparable price.  While I was there, I was hoping to pick up some more spray paint (yes, it's a do-it-yourself story in the making) and a fan deck for the Martha Stewart by Valspar colors.  I've never specified any Martha colors, instead sticking with Benjamin Moore and Sherwin-Williams.  But Jenny (of the Little Green Notebook) seems to be a big fan of the Martha colors, especially when painting furniture, so I wanted to pick up a fan deck for reference.  I circled the paint section twice in search of the Martha display.  When I didn't spot it the second time, I asked the Lowe's employee behind the paint desk.  He said something to the effect of, "I think her colors are still in the system, but we've pulled down the display."  

So now, I was curious!  Thanks to the magic of the iPhone (I love you, Apple), I quickly learned that Martha has a new deal with Home Depot.  Per this article, Martha will be selling all sorts of goodies at Home Depot, ranging from outdoor sets to closet organizers to other general decor.  Now, this doesn't sound all that strange when you realize that Martha's deal with K-Mart (for her Martha Stewart Everyday line) expires in January 2010.  But what on earth does that mean for her deal with Lowe's, which exclusively carried her Martha Stewart by Valspar paints? 

I'm guessing it doesn't mean anything good ... at least not for Lowe's.  I couldn't find any information about when Martha's contract with Lowe's expires or more importantly, what will happen to her colors!  When you check Martha's own website, you still see a hyperlink at the bottom of the home page, in the "Shop" section, entitled "Martha Stewart Colors at Lowe's."  But when you click the link, you get a big fat nothing.  Same thing with the "Paint" section of her site.  It sure looks like everything's hunky dory until you try to click the "learn more" links, which also take you to a big fat nothing.  When you go to the Valspar at Lowe's website, and then search "signature colors by designer," Martha is nowhere to be found. 

I find this all verrrrrry interesting.  Martha is acting like everything is fine, while Lowe's is attempting to erase every indication that she ever existed in their stores.  Yet there's no press release or any information about what is going on.  Someone is maaaaaaad!  I can't wait to get the skinny on this ...  In the meantime, does anyone have a Martha Stewart fan deck for me???? 

Photo from DailyComedy.com.  Thanks to Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers for the title of today's post!

Last week I attended a Benjamin Moore webinar entitled Color Pulse 2011.  The idea, of course, was to give a preview of the direction in which color trends will have moved by 2011.  The overarching trend is Balance - who doesn't strive for that in their lives? - and within that, Benjamin Moore highlighted four themes or color groupings:  The Farm, Order, Escape and Tribe.  I’ll take them each in turn.   

The Farm is inspired by the return to our roots and fresh, locally grown products.  Color inspiration comes many of the foods you find on a farm – not only the, creamy soft whites and pale neutrals (i.e., eggs) but also the rich browns (i.e., soil), buttery yellows (i.e., hay and butter), botanical greens and vegetable brights (i.e., eggplant, tomatoes and peas).  In the words of the moderator, in addition to the soft shades commonly associated with nature, you’ll see the “peas, corns and carrots” that ruled in the seventies.      

With a return to nature, however, also comes a desire for Order in our lives.  With Order, geometrics take center stage and primary colors dominate.  It’s a move away from the neon shades and towards more livable, long term color translations.      

Of course, we all want to Escape – even if it’s just the idea of a vacation or some peace and quiet.  With Escape, you’ll see dreamy pales with feminine undertones.  The colors are sheer and almost translucent, but often paired with a rich carbon gray for contrast.  A pearlized finish with Escape is a softer translation of the metallic trend.   

Finally, we are all comforted when we are part of a Tribe.  That might sound strange, but we are all part of various urban and social tribes.  With the desire to identify with a tribe comes a movement toward rich tones – berry and teal, for example – as well as a “liquid gold” bronze finish … perhaps inspired by the amazing gold jewelry worn by some African women.   

Interesting, isn’t it?   New directions or trends generally show up through accessories first – pillows, throws, lamps and the like – and then are later translated to walls through paint.  Some of the trends are, of course, a continuation of things we are already seeing, and those are the most likely to become popular paint shades first.  After all, who doesn’t love the soft, creamy pales of the farm?  A house simply done in shades inspired by fresh eggs would be gorgeous.  I dare you to tell me that this isn’t beautiful.

But here’s what I thought was just great.  I’ve spoken often about the intersection of fashion design and interior design, and the moderator even spoke about how fashion is generally a couple of years ahead of interior design.  So, as I was reading The New York Times that very evening, guess what showed up at Chanel (of all places) for Spring 2010?  

Hee haw!  Seriously, Karl put on a barnyard show.  As Cathy Horyn wrote here, “Inside the Grand Palais, Chanel built its version of Marie Antoinette’s barn, with a straw mound that contained a hidden door for the models to come and go in their natural-looking tweeds, clogs, egg basket purses, and lovely white crocheted outfits with French blue and red flowers.”  

In the words of Jason Aldean (I told you I like country music; don't be a hater), it seems the whole world’s “gone country” … chic! 

Photos from Benjamin Moore , Lynn Harris (The Little Red Hen) and The New York Times     

The Bachelorette hosted a large group of girls last week for their monthly "wine club" gathering.  What fun!  She was thrilled by the rave reviews that her new interior design garnered.  And the girls didn't even see the finished product ... pillows, rugs, etc. still to come!  Anyway, as much fun as she had with her friends, she was not very happy to see that some light, unintentional bumps to the wall left her with not-so-attractive black scuff marks on the paint.  At chair height and behind where the dining table usually sits, the scuffs were quite noticeable.  Annoying, of course, but you remember this post, right?  With as new as her paint is, I was confident we'd be able to touch it up easily. 

All The Bachelorette had to do was whip out the appropriate Qwikie Paint Touch-up Tool.  I'm sure a variety of methods would work just fine, but here's what I recommend - gently shake/stir the touch-up container to ensure that the paint is thoroughly mixed.  Use the attached brush to lightly paint over the scuffed areas.  Use a small trim or touch-up roller to smooth any brush strokes and feather the wet paint outward (in an effort to blend).  Girls, this really isn't all that different from applying concealer!  Once the paint dries, it should be good as new.   We ended up giving The Bachelorette two coats - I applied it so lightly the first time that you could still see some lingering scuff "shadows" - and now her walls are back to perfect.  

I am left with one query - would her walls have scuffed as badly if the painters would have used Benjamin Moore's Aura ... or Sherwin-Williams' Duration Home?  My gut says no.  The painters did not use a premium product (by either Benjamin Moore or Sherwin-Williams, for that matter), but instead "color-matched" the Benjamin Moore and Sherwin-Williams colors that we chose to their preferred brand of paint.  Unfortunately, I've not been super impressed with the product they chose.  I think they use it mainly because the price is good.  But the wall still looks great ... so all's well that ends well, I suppose!        

How many of you want to touch up those scrapes or smudges on your wall paint ... but you'd have to actually find the old paint in the garage or basement, dig out the right can (if you can remember), stir it up, get a brush or roller, etc.?  And that just seems like too much work.  Hey, I'm right there with you!   With the long list of things that we all have to do, sometimes that just doesn't rise to the top of the list.  Well, I think I have solved that problem!  Enter the Qwikie Paint Touch-up Tool.  This product is absolutely genius.  Think of an extra-large bottle of nail polish.  As the Qwikie website explains, the heavy duty plastic container holds 13 ounces of paint,  which is more than enough for a small touch-up job.  I'm all about quick and easy, so I love that you can gently shake up the container itself instead of having to mix the paint up with a separate mixing stick.  The cap has a brush with high quality acrylic bristles built into it, so there's no need to hunt for a brush or roller.  A built-in wiper at the top of the container lets you easily remove any excess paint from the brush.  Label the container with the paint color and the room(s) in which it is used, and you are all set!  I ordered mine online at GrandinRoad, but of course, they are out of stock.  You can also check out the Qwikie website, which has an online store (albeit temporarily closed for maintenance).   

If you can't find the Qwikie Paint Touch-up Tool, there's a similar product called the Rubbermaid Paint Buddy that I've seen in local Lowe's and Home Depot stores.  It is smaller than the Qwikie Paint Touch-up Tool, so don't expect to use it for larger touch-ups, but it does come with a built-in roller that can be removed for cleaning or replaced.  I like the simplicity of the Qwikie Paint Touch-up Tool, but - considering that I'll probably use a roller over what I paint using the Qwikie brush - I see the appeal of the Rubbermaid version.  Regardless, the point is that both of these products make it easy for you to do touch-ups in a jif.  

Check out what I left The Bachelorette with after the painting was done in her home. 

So ... no more excuses!

Photos from Qwikie and Rubbermaid

In a previous post, I discussed my attempts at living a "greener" (yet still design-savvy) life.   Really, I try very hard ... but one area in which I fall short is my semi-refusal to use CFLs (Compact Flourescent Lightbulbs).   Yes, yes, yes, I know all of the facts.  One CFL can save over $30 in electricity over the life of a lamp and save many times its own weight in greenhouse gas emissions.  They are more expensive than standard bulbs, but allegedly last many times as long.  (I'm somewhat dubious about this because I had a couple burn out super quickly ... within a month or two.  I was really baffled by that.)  "Soft white" CFLs are the best and they aren't all that different from standard bulbs.  Please notice the emphasis on all that!  

 My favorite light bulbs - since their introduction - are the GE Reveal.  GE Reveal bulbs filter out dull incandescent rays so that you are left with only clean, beautiful light.  I love them!!!   At one time, every light bulb in my house was a GE Reveal.  In a continued effort to be more environmentally conscious, however, I did replace many of the light bulbs in my house with CFLs ... including the bulbs in my recessed cans.   I was already annoyed with them because CFLs have to "warm up" - after you turn them on, they take a while to reach their full brightness.  Well, I move rather quickly around my house and I'm really peeved when I turn on the light to do something but have to wait several minutes until I can see.  But I was willing to deal with that minor inconvenience.  Big of me, I know.  But here's the straw that broke the camel's back.  I was sitting in my living room looking through the door to the master suite ... when I noticed that my beloved Caffe Creme paint from Restoration Hardware looked distinctively green.  It's a cream paint, but it had a distinctively green cast to it.  Really?  It had never been green before!   This baffled me for days, and I chalked it up to the contrast between the Caffe Creme in the master hallway and new paint in the living room.  Finally it dawned on me that the CFLs in the hallway's recessed cans were casting their funky light on my cream paint, causing it to look greenish.  A few new GE Reveals later and my problem was solved.  I have so far resisted replacing all of my CFLs with GE Reveal bulbs, but I must admit that I am very tempted.  I'm sorry!  I know I shouldn't feel that way.  I promise to always bring my reusable shopping bags and to turn off every unused light in the house!    

 One side note - another downside to CFLs is that there are very few that are dimmer-friendly.  So despite my initial replacement strategy, the chandelier bulbs in the dining room remained GE Reveals ... and at this rate, will continue to do so.  

Restoration Hardware, I apologize.   I have long-maligned your paint.  True, the colors are beautiful ... but you have a penchant for discontinuing them.  And then what??   As I found out the hard way, once a color is discontinued, it is truly discontinued.   I had hoped that they just renamed my beloved Caffe Creme, but alas, it was gone for good.  Unlike a Benjamin Moore or Sherwin-Williams retailer, Restoration Hardware doesn't have stored formulas that they can replicate on demand.  Of course, you can attempt to "color match" ... but the Restoration Hardware color itself is gone.   A bientot, Caffe Creme.  It was nice knowing you.  

Unfortunately, nothing about the above has changed... but yesterday's discovery may be enough to redeem Restoration Hardware paint for all prior sins.  Thanks to my own version of double trouble, the walls of my master bedroom and bathroom (painted Caffe Creme) had more than a few scuff marks and a little bit of crayon artwork.  As I'm sure I will elaborate on in a subsequent post, I do not believe that any paint - no matter what the finish - is truly washable.  I'm sorry to burst your bubble, but it just isn't.  But back to my story.  I knew that "washing" the wall would leave shadows.  Given the age of the paint (at least four years), I anticipated that any touchup would require repainting the entire wall ... but I was really tired of the crayon on the wall.  Nervously, I opened the last-remaining can of Caffe Creme paint (carefully stored in an indoor closet).   The paint was absolutely disgusting.  It was completely separated, and I wondered whether I would ever be able to get it re-mixed.   After a lot (and I mean a lot) of stirring, the paint began to take on its original appearance.  As I painted the walls with a tiny touch-up paint roller and tray, I thought "this is not going to work.   Darn it, I'm going to have to tape off the trim and paint the entire wall."   Well, I am not embarrassed to admit that I was wrong.   After the new paint dried, the touch-up paint blended perfectly with the old paint.  You can't tell the difference anywhere.  There isn't a single clue that part of the wall has new paint and part of the wall has old paint.   Instead, the wall just looks freshly painted with all scuff marks and crayon marks gone.  Ecstatic, I marched around with my tiny touch-up roller and painted over scuffs to my heart's content.   Now that I know how easy it is to touch up the Restoration Hardware paint, my walls should look freshly painted for years to come.   And I am absolutely delighted.  One caveat - I can't guarantee that this will work as well with any other brand of paint.  To my great chagrin, a previous touch-up with a different and unnamed brand of paint did not go nearly as well.  Instead my wall had a murky patch ... which was not an improvement over the scuff marks. 

FYI, painting over red and blue crayon with a cream paint requires more than one coat.   Memo to other moms of toddlers: Invest in Color Wonder markers.