I used to think picking paint was simple.

Walk into the store, grab a nice beige, and slap it on the walls. Done.

Then I painted a cabinet in my first apartment.

That “perfect neutral” I’d chosen? It looked completely different once it was up.

I’d made the classic mistake most people make with color.

I’d treated it like it existed in a vacuum.

Here’s the truth: Colour is always in context

Color doesn’t exist alone. Ever.

That dreamy soft grey you loved at the paint store?

Put it next to your warm oak floors and suddenly it’s something else entirely.

Let me walk you through the four biggest color mistakes I see (and how to avoid them):

Mistake #1: Ignoring Undertones

Every color has two personalities:

• Masstone = the color you think you’re seeing (”It’s green!”)
• Undertone = the sneaky hue underneath that changes everything. (”Wait… It’s a bit yellow, is it olive?”)

You need to read your colors. What undertone does it carry?

That beige may lean pink, the grey may lean green, and the white may lean yellow.

If you ignore your undertones, that’s how you may end up with walls that look faintly purple or sickly green.

Mistake #2: Going all warm or all cool

Too much of one thing is never good.

A room filled only with cool tones feels like a dentist’s office.

All warm tones? Stuffy and overwhelming.

You need balance. Most designers use an 80/20 split—80% warm with 20% cool accents, or vice versa.

Think coastal interiors: predominantly cool blues and whites, but warmed up with timber and natural textures.

Mistake #3: Mixing Clear & Muted Colours

This one’s subtle but deadly for your room’s harmony.

• Clear colors, e.g. lemon yellow, sky blue.
• Muted colors, e.g. olive, mauve, sage, dark brown.

Maybe you’re wondering what actually makes a color bright or muted in the first place.

It’s all about chroma—how pure the color is.

Take red, for example. You’ve got firetruck red (high chroma, bright and pure) and brick red (low chroma, muted and earthy). Same color family, totally different feeling.

Mix clear and muted colors together and they rarely end well (at least not in the same amount). Make sure one is dominant.

Why? The clear color will look harsh and cheap against the muted backdrop. The muted color will look dirty and dull next to the bright one.

Bria Hammel Interiors (left) & Jacob Snavely (photographer) (right)

The fix: Pick a lane and stay in it. If you want to combine them, make sure that either the muted or the bright color is dominant. The opposite should only be used in very small doses.

Mistake #4: Ignoring Surrounding Materials

Your paint isn’t working alone.

Those red-toned hardwood floors? They’re casting warm hues around the room.

That grey marble countertop? It reflects cool tones.

Your paint needs to play nicely with all of these existing colors, or it won’t look good at all.

Here’s what I always tell my students: Sample your paint in the actual room. Look at it in morning light, evening light, under your lamps.

Want the Easy Version?

Color theory gets complicated fast, but it doesn’t have to be overwhelming.

That’s why I made this super straightforward video to walk you through what goes with what and why.

​

Cheers,
Reynard

​