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Dear Annie,
I have a cream-background wallpaper in the dining room and have painted the trim with the same [cream]: Benjamin Moore Mystic Beige 2162-60. I painted the wall below the chair rail a deep red (Ralph Lauren's Nobleman VM74), which picks up color in the wallpaper and drapes.


The wallpaper is old, probably vintage 1967 from the year the house was built, but it's in great shape and my family all voted to keep it. I'm painting everything else around in an attempt to rejuvenate the room. The living room, visible in the cream molding photo, is painted Benjamin Moore Atrium white with bright white trim.


What do I do with the ceiling and the crown molding? They are both a bright white and it looks odd. Should I paint the crown the same creamy trim color and the ceiling white? Both the cream? All the rest of the ceilings, crown and trim in adjoining rooms are bright white. Thanks for the tips and I love the blog.
-Dale Glass, Potomac, MD


Dear Dale: Wallpaper is back in a big way - especially in dining rooms - so your question is quite timely.

The short, easy answer is CREAM: go with your instincts and paint the crown moulding the Mystic Beige in the semi-gloss finish, and paint the ceiling the same color in a flat finish.

But that's not a very bossy answer, is it? Tasteful, yes. Imaginative, not hardly.

Here's why I couldn't let go of your question. If you and your family are bold enough to keep wallpaper from 1967, I think you should set it off a bit more. The deep red wainscoting is perfectly nice, but paired with the wallpaper - and the alluded-to drapes - I'm getting an 80's vibe.


I don't think the wallpaper is kitschy enough go the ironic route...by, say, painting the wall below the chair rail an outrageous contrasty color like hot pink, or a bronze metallic. Judging from the sliver of living room we glimpse in one of your photographs, that's not how you roll anyway.

So a better route would be to channel our inner Brits and ask ourselves, WWF&BD? (What Would Farrow & Ball Do?)

What if we painted all of the trim a greyish blue (Oval Room Blue #85) and the wall below the chair rail a greenish grey (Pigeon #25)? Neither color would match the wallpaper exactly; these are intentionally more muted.


So what would happen? I'll tell you what would happen. Interesting but elegant gorgeousness, that's what would happen. (And you could keep the ceiling cream.)

I know you just finished washing the cranberry paint out of your brushes, but if the wallpaper survives another year, maybe you'll be ready for a new approach next Thanksgiving.

(Some people are weird that way, repainting their rooms all the time. No one *I* know, but I'm pretty sure I read it somewhere...)

The '80s living room photo is from Maria Killam's fantastic blog, Colour Me Happy.

Washingtonian.com featured My Notting Hill's Michele Ginnerty and me in their column today about decorating your Thanksgiving table. Thank you!

I think there were some good ideas in there, if I do say so myself :)


(No scatalogical conifer references, though...for that, you'll have to see bossy color's previous interview about Thanksgiving decorations.)

I hope you all have a fantastic Thanksgiving, no matter what you put on your table :)

Thank you, Walla Walla Union Bulletin! They interviewed me for a story on inexpensive, accessible decorations for Thanksgiving.

So what were my bright ideas? Well, that sentence was a clue, and here's an equally subtle visual hint...



(Bonus points for identifying the quotation I wish I could take back. That's what happens when the reporter is super cool and you end up laughing really, really hard.)

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