Decorating With Sunny Yellow Paint Colors

Not just for nurseries and kitchens, yellow can be smart, sophisticated and sexy — in any room of your home.

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Yellow Paint in the Powder Room
Think "New York" and you're apt to think taxicabs: the bright yellow fleet that dominates the landscape and lends the city much of its high-energy look. To create a similarly vibrant effect in a New York City powder room, designer Barclay Fryery chose a bright shade that's as welcome as a cab as it is on a rainy day.

"This apartment belongs to a modern-day 'it girl' and stockbroker to the stars," Fryery says. "And the rest of the rooms are camel, black, cream and white, just like her delicious clothes. But for the powder room, I wanted something lively and fresh and unexpectedly modern." Because there are no moldings to separate one plane from another, Fryery painted the ceiling the same color as the walls: Farrow and Ball's Dayroom Yellow #233.

"Surrounding the room in a single color adds a finished look," he says. "In a small powder room you always need to have a wow factor, so be bold, and be dramatic."

Photo by Chi Chi Ubina