Colour tricks for room decorating

One of the most important things to bear in mind when decorating a room in your home is how to use colour on the walls to create the look that you want. Colour can be used to highlight, modernise, disguise or add a period look to the room. Paler tones and deeper shades can change the apparent size and shape of a room and can highlight the rooms most attractive features.

Warm and cosy: If you want to make a room feel warmer and cosier, you can achieve this using the desired paint colour you have chosen over the walls and the rooms ceiling. This technique makes the room feel smaller and is mostly suited to studies and dining rooms.

Awkward shapes: Pipes, alcoves, too many doors and so on can be disguised by painting them to match the wall colour. This also makes a fireplace wall look like it is further into the room than it really is.

Narrow the room: Painting two opposite walls in a darker colour than used on the remaining walls makes the room feel longer and narrower. A bold pattern would also achieve the same effect. Bear in mind that this paint treatment should be avoided in long through rooms and narrow hallways.

Attention to detail: Use coloured paint on period fireplaces, mouldings, doors and cornices to highlight the rooms details.

Attract attention:  Paint can create a focal point in a room - use a strong colour where you want attention in the room or on a fireplace wall. You can achieve the same effect with wallpaper thus making a 'feature wall'.

More intimate: Having high ceilings can make a room feel cold so by painting it in a warm, dark colour it will give the illusion of the ceiling being lower than it actually is.