paint colors

This is one of the colors we're considering for the house, the geographically unlikely "short grass prairie." It's only recently edged out "carriage door" which looked too muddy in sunlight. A favorite among the color names, but not the color itself so much, is "porpoise." We'd probably regret choosing a color for its name alone, even if we could say "we painted it Porpoise on porpoise."

Click here for a page of other possibilities.

One of the painters we talked to told us that the Period Eclectic style, the trend to build houses in the 1920s with French Provincial, English Tudor, Spanish Mission, Mediterranean or otherwise international features, took off because of the movies. All of a sudden a variety of architectural types and periods were visible across the country. It does make sense. A lot of those houses look more like they were designed after movie sets than actual historic buildings.

As far as the Period Eclectic goes, ours is a tame example. Only the hinges on the front door and the modest stained glass window in the dining room suggest that the builder was aiming for a Tudor. There is one down the street, though, with awnings in a sort of Renaissance Fair style. It's something to see.