I've just returned from a vacation to the Washington, DC area and will begin painting the interior of my home this week. Since I've had paint colors on my mind for a few weeks now, I took notice of the paint color choices and painting techniques in many of the places we visited. I was most interested on our trip to Mount Vernon. Here are a few of my observations:

1. Rustication of the exterior: I was fascinated by how the pine was notched to resemble stone and then painted with sand to complete the look. The home is currently more beige than white, which is due to the ground sandstone in the paint. (The old material was ground-up oyster shells, I was told, which caused the home to appear more white.) This technique is also used at the Lee home at Arlington Cemetery.

2. Faux finishes in the interior: The docent told us that the walls in the center part of the home were actually Southern yellow pine that had been painted to resemble red mahogany. I had to look very closely to see it. The banister is real mahogany and does appear darker than the walls, perhaps because of the many hands that have rubbed it over the years.

3. Extremely bold color in the interior: The docent told us that colored paint was very expensive at the time, and the Washingtons used some very bold colors in the interior (aqua, bright Kelly green, etc.). One room is being restored at the moment, and Fine Paints of Europe is assisting with re-creating the original color. In fact, FPE has a Mount Vernon paint deck that one can purchase for $50 (refundable with paint purchase).

4. Innovative items: The rolling chair and the fan chair in Washington's office were interesting. Also, Washington designed a unique barn specifically for removing wheat from the chaff, called a treading barn.

Unfortunately, photos were not allowed in the interior of Mount Vernon. I went to google image search and searched "Mount Vernon interior" to look at some pictures.

Mount Vernon was one of the highlights of the trip for me, and I just wanted to share some of the things that I thought were interesting about the design of the home :-)