Turquoise? Plum?

Whatever color you choose, I'd then put a container of flowers in a similar color on the porch. Seems like you've got a lot of shade, so maybe some impatiens? or, if you can't find flowers in the right color(um, turquoise could be tricky!) maybe paint the planter in the same color as your door and use white flowers.

I love your house!

Both great ideas! Turquoise would definitely be fun, and I can see picking that up in the color of planters. I'd thought of plum, but I wonder if any nice plum shade would be too dark to read as plum. I painted the door of my old house plum and I had to go much lighter than I expected to avoid having to color just read as black from a distance and in the shade. This porch is not only deep, but it faces north, so sun will pretty much never hit that door.

I like the idea of something in the purple family. How about something like Ben Moore Dark Lilac?

Here is a link that might be useful: BM Dark Lilac

Robins egg blue, it's a gorgeous color.

I was going to say blue, I hate copying the neighbors, but look how nice their blue houses go with yours. Cute neighborhood.

Very cute house! I also think blue might work well - a blue similar to the house on the left. You might repeat the color on a wooden bench or chairs on the porch.

If the house color is indeed much more pink then blue might not work as well so other colors to consider are eggplant (darker than plum), dark sage, lime green, bright coral.

Of course if you change the door color you might want to change the color of the porch floor! ;-D

All good ideas! Clearly I am going to have to paint some samples and see how they look behind the storm door.

An advantage of using something in the plum-aubergine range is I'm going to use little bits those in my living room, so the door would look fine inside on those few occasions it's open. I do think a darker-than-plum color would read as *very* dark against the generally light palette of the house.

A vote for simple fresh white (with LOTS of plum/purple accents on the porch) OR for the plum/purple color!

Jan at Rosemary Cottage

How do you feel about the main color of the house? Whatever you put on the door will have an impact on the way the rest of the house reads.

If you want to have it less pinky-beige, paint it with a color closer to red, like a reddish purple, coral or even hot pink. That will push the field color back to neutral. If you use a blue or a green, anything from the opposite side of the color wheel, you will push the pink forward.

Any of the aforementioned colors will be fun, but do be aware of the impact of color theory on the whole equation.

I also like to consider landscaping when I ponder house color. If you have a favorite kind of flower or shrub you plan to incorporate, that would be good to consider in the mix. I have a bright red-orange front door and while I love it, I am considering changing it to a bright acidy green because it will allow me to be more flexible with my container plants on the porch.

Very cute house, btw! :-)

amysrq, I hate the color of the house, but I'm going to live with it for a year or two while I think about what I really want to do. Down the road a bit, new wood door, period hardware and lighting, new house numbers, new porch color, and new total house color scheme. So the door-painting project is just a short-term update. I do want to use something that will work with the current house color, but it doesn't need to be something that will be part of the eventual total makeover. Likewise with landscaping: I'm going to see what grows through the summer or fall and then start to make longer-term decisions next year.

Any color would go. I think an orangery - red or something similar to the rug on the porch would give it some punch.

Amysrq, I realize I read your message in haste as I was heading out the door earlier. That's a very good point about how the door color will affect how the house's beige reads. I think it does make sense not to emphasize its pinkness....I wonder how a plum tone, which has both warms and cools, will affect the main house's color.

One idea that occurred to me as I was out and about: how about a fairly deep plum for the porch floor and something a little lighter/brighter for the door? Anything has got to be better than the battleship gray porch floor that's there now.

Hi Carinr, I am glad you came back and posted again. I thought maybe didn't get my point across well enough. Even if you plan for a new color scheme in the future, there is no need to make the pinky-beige worse in the meantime. It may also take longer than you think to repaint so you might as well make it the best you can for right now.

You can certainly experiment with the purple. And a deeper terra cotta/orange would really wrestle that field color into submission, too. As for the dark floor, do think about dirt and dust. Day-to-day, a mid-tone will hide the most mess. Very dark or very light will always be problematic. But, if the front door doesn't see a lot of use, it might be a gamble worth taking.

Blues and some greens may end up making the house look even pinker. I think I would go for a red tone from the brick steps. Not dark, tho. Something vibrant like a deep coral red.

If you are up for it, I would also paint the porch floor white. It will brighten the whole area, and make the chunky railing less prominent. Then a big pot of greenery to the left of the door to bring your eye up and to the entry.

Amy's probably right that either a too-dark or a too-light floor is asking for trouble, since I'll be in and out the front door with dogs all the time. Though a rug that actually covers the high-traffic route from the steps to the front door would go some way towards solving that problem. There definitely needs to be something visually interesting to the left of the door, as several of you have suggested, because as it stands that's a pretty big expanse of bare, beige shingle.

Here are a couple of rough mockups. Couldn't get the colors quite right and I'm working on a laptop w/out an additional monitor, so the colors look different to me.

Anyway, since your door is in the shade, you'll probably need to go lighter with the color than you might think looking at the samples. I'd recommend priming and painting a couple of full sized wallboard pieces, propping them on the porch and looking at them at different times of day.

I love the thought of something else to match the door, like a planter or maybe painting your house numbers.

{{!gwi}}

Chicagoans, that's really helpful! I know what you mean about needing to go lighter, though maybe not quite that bright. In any case, though I was thinking turquoise at first, your pics make me see the value (no pun intended) in a warmer color. I'm going to be near the hardware store that has the biggest selection of BM ready-mixed paint samples later this morning, so I'll pick up a few to try.

Update: Samples were a bit thin on the ground at my usual hardware store, so I ordered large swatches from myperfectcolor.com of Benjamin Moore Poppy (to try out a red); Peacock Blue, Tropicana Cabana, and Aruba Blue in the turquoise range; and Fire And Ice, Purple Heart, Purple Rain, Majestic Violet, and Dark Lilac for the purples. Will post pics of them in situ on door and porch floor when they arrive.

I'm just throwing this out there not knowing what it would like it up on your storm door.

http://cgi.ebay.com/35-INCH-WIDE-ARTS-AND-CRAFTS-Stained-Glass-Window-Film-/220771436358?_trksid=p4340.m263&_trkparms=algo%3DSIC%26its%3DI%252BC%26itu%3DUCI%252BIA%252BUA%252BFICS%252BUFI%26otn%3D10%26pmod%3D220768461741%26ps%3D63%26clkid%3D8924921499210414113

I just hit the smaller picture there and the color's all wrong, too much amber. Oh well, I thought the idea was fun.

But it was a good idea to check out. I didn't know those existed for doors. The storm door actually does have a bit of an etched pattern in it.

OK: samples arrived in the mail and I taped a few of them up. I know it's not the best technique to put them all up at the same time, but I thought I'd just throw them up there and see how I felt about them. The red is "Poppy", purples are "Fire and Ice" (weird name) at top and "Purple Heart", bottom; and turquoises are "Aruba Blue" left and "Peacock Blue" right (all BM). The other purples I got are much darker. Based on this tiny experiment, I'm kind of leaning towards purple or red.

Like the red, and the Aruba Blue. Wouldn't mind a red with just a touch more brown in it.

Not a fan of the lighter aqua, and the purples make the siding look like the old 'flesh' color in the Crayola box to me. Sorry.

A bright royal blue might work, too.

Do you know what Benjamin Moore color comes closest to your house color so I can check it on my fan deck? Fire and Ice looks totally different on my sample than it does on my monitor where it's coming up like a royal blue. The Poppy looks pretty close in color. I have to hunt up my other deck to see if those other colors are in there.

Les917, that's really funny - when I first saw this house, the "flesh" Crayola crayon is exactly what I thought of, and I've been telling everybody around here, "I bought the flesh-toned bungalow"!

chickadee2, interesting, on my monitor the Fire and Ice looks quite close to how it looks in the fan deck, which is a mid-range plum - not too lavender, minimally grape. Anyway, really good idea to check the shingle colors against the fan deck. I will do that when I'm next over at the house and let you know.

les917, on royal blue: I can see that that would work, but I'm just not a royal blue fan (strange, since I like practically every other blue), plus it would be weird with the blue of the house next door, I think.

Also, for everyone, remember we can pick two colors, one for the door and one for the porch!

I think you have to be really careful what colors you put with that flesh color, because from the street it could read "fun" or "colorblind". LOL

How about a deep, bright pumpkin color?

In the OP, you described your house color as "band-aid". I just took a look at the packaging on a real band-aid brand band-aid. The other 2 colors that the professional product designers have used are a bright red and a royal blue.

I like red with your house.

of the colors you have up on the door, i most like aruba blue... it actually looks quite nice i think.

i would choose more of a plum color if going with purple i think...something more along the lines of kalamata, plum perfect or summer plum.....

I know you were looking for a "fun" colour, but I would echo Jan's comment about a white door with lots of pops of colour with planters and benches, etc. OR you could paint the door to look like wood using a "faux wood" technique.

Just adding some more ideas for you to ponder...

fillagirl

Another vote for a redder purple -- Something less grape and more plum. The color of red grapes, but more intense.

Another possibility would be a vibrant coral-red -- Something with a hint of pink, a bit more orange, but rich and vibrant enough that you want to call it red. Your Poppy color is close, but I'd go a shade or two darker and high-gloss.

Carin, if you are in the Alexandria VA area (we have an area (DelRay) with lots of wonderful bungalows like yours), try the Ace Hardware on S. Washington Street. They have a couple of paint guys are are amazing with color. Totally unexpected, but they really are excellent when you need advice. I can describe what I want and they can steer me to the right shade almost every time-actually every time so far. My only mistakes are when I choose something myself-lol.

Oh, and I like the Aruba Blue or red with your house. If you change the shakes, then I would go with a purple which is one of my favorite door colors.

Thanks, everyone. I didn't manage to get over there to compare my fan deck to the shingle color today, but I will tomorrow. cyn427, I'm in DC, so I will definitely plan to pay a visit to the magic paint guys in Alexandria!

More soon -

OK - Chickadee2, the color of my shingles is a cross between BM 1151 Shorewood and 1136 Point Beach. Clearly a color the previous owners really had to work to achieve! :-)

I agree about "more plum, less grape". I think a nice plummy purple would look great and would become a focal point and distract from the flesh color. I bet you like the shingle color a little once your door looks better with it.
One note: I am not crazy for the brass numbers next to your siding. Can you spray paint them another color?

I did order a bunch more purple swatches that I haven't put up, so I'll try a different selection next time I'm there with my camera.

It should be possible to paint the numbers. Weirdly, they don't bother me all that much, at least in comparison to the whole house's color. I think I might just wait to deal with those till I do a more extensive exterior makeover, but I'll keep an eye out for good number options.