Colour schemes for a room

1Why this matters

You have probably walked into a room that felt calm and restful, and into another that felt busy, even though both were clean and tidy. Very often the difference is the colour scheme: which colours were chosen, and how much of each was used.

A colour scheme is a planned group of colours used together. Decorators choose schemes from the colour wheel, so that the colours work together instead of fighting. In this lesson you will learn the main schemes, how colour changes the look of a room, and how to plan a scheme starting from a single piece of kitenge.

2The main colour schemes

• Monochromatic: one hue, used in its tints, shades and tones, for example pale blue walls, mid-blue curtains and navy cushions. Calm and restful; good for a bedroom.
• Analogous: two to four hues that sit side by side on the wheel, for example yellow, yellow-orange and orange. They share a parent colour, so they look harmonious and easy to live with.
• Complementary: two hues exactly opposite each other: red and green, yellow and violet, blue and orange. This gives the strongest contrast. It is lively, but at full strength over large areas it tires the eye, so use one colour as the main one and the other as a small accent.
• Split-complementary: one hue plus the two hues on either side of its opposite, for example yellow with red-violet and blue-violet. It has strong contrast but less clash than a complementary pair.
• Triadic: three hues evenly spaced round the wheel, every fourth hue, for example red, yellow and blue. Bright and playful, often used in children's rooms and classrooms.
• Neutral: black, white, grey, beige and brown, often with one small accent colour.

3How colour changes a room

• Light colours reflect light, so a small or dark room looks bigger and brighter. Dark colours absorb light, so they make a big room feel smaller and cosier.
• Warm colours seem to advance. Painting the far wall of a long, narrow room in a warm colour makes it seem nearer, so the room looks better proportioned.
• Cool colours seem to recede and feel calm. They make a hot, sunny room feel cooler and a small room feel larger.
• A ceiling painted lighter than the walls seems higher.
• A neutral next to a strong colour seems to take on a little of the opposite hue: a grey wall beside a bright red sofa looks slightly greenish.

4How much of each colour: the 60-30-10 rule

A simple guide for balance is to give about 60% of the room to a dominant colour (walls, a large rug), about 30% to a second colour (curtains, sofa covers) and about 10% to an accent colour (cushions, a vase, a picture).

Worked example: a scheme from one kitenge

Umutoni buys a length of kitenge like the one in the photo to make cushion covers for a small sitting room with one window. She plans the rest of the room around it.

Step 1: name the colours in the fabric. A yellow background, blue and violet leaves, small white areas and dark green outlines.

Step 2: find the relationships on the wheel. Yellow and violet are opposite each other, so they are complementary: that is why the fabric looks so bright. Blue sits close to violet, on the cool side of the wheel.

Step 3: apply 60-30-10.

• 60%, the walls: a pale tint of yellow (cream). It picks up the background of the fabric, and as a light colour it makes the small room look larger.
• 30%, the sofa covers and curtains: a deep blue-violet, which is cool and calm and links to the leaves.
• 10%, the accents: the kitenge cushions themselves, and perhaps a violet vase.

Step 4: check. The room has a light, warm dominant colour, a darker cool second colour, and the cushions tie the two together because they contain both. The strong yellow-violet contrast appears only in the small accent areas, so the room is lively but not tiring.

Practice

Solution. Blue. Orange is a mix of red and yellow; its opposite on the wheel is the one primary not used to make it.

Solution. Analogous: the three hues sit next to each other on the wheel.

Solution. A light tint. Light colours reflect the little daylight there is and make the room look bigger. A dark shade would absorb the light and make the room feel smaller and gloomier.

Solution. Red and green are complementary, so at full strength over large areas they clash and tire the eye. She could keep the contrast but use a pale tint or a neutral for the walls (60%), a deep green for the sofa (30%), and keep bright red for small accents such as cushions (10%).