Mixing Paint Colors and Patterns

Ever walk into a house and think, "I'd never think to put those colors/patterns/fabrics together in one room, but I love it!"? HGTV Magazine features designer Ramey Caulkins, with a houseful of ideas for mixing things up.

By: Kendell Cronstrom

From: HGTV Magazine

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Photo By: Photography by David Tsay; styling by Matthew Gleason

Photo By: Image Courtesy of Philip Friedman/Studio D

Photo By: Photography by David Tsay; styling by Matthew Gleason

Photo By: Image Courtesy of Philip Friedman/Studio D

Photo By: Photography by David Tsay; styling by Matthew Gleason

Photo By: Photography by David Tsay; styling by Matthew Gleason

Photo By: Image Courtesy of Philip Friedman/Studio D

Photo By: Photography by David Tsay; styling by Matthew Gleason

Photo By: Image Courtesy of Philip Friedman/Studio D

Photo By: Photography by David Tsay; styling by Matthew Gleason

Photo By: Image Courtesy of Philip Friedman/Studio D

Photo By: Photography by David Tsay; styling by Matthew Gleason

Photo By: Image Courtesy of Philip Friedman/Studio D

Outside

Denver designer Ramey Caulkins and her husband, Max, had been looking for a house with a sense of history, something that reminded them of the Buffalo home she grew up in. But when plans for a remodel of an older home fell through, they ended up in a brand-new house. Ramey wasted no time going to work to make the new house feel like her childhood home.

From: HGTV Magazine

Red Front Door + Gray Siding + Cream and Black Trim

To capture the been-there-forever look, Ramey painted the house charcoal gray and the window frames high-gloss black. "The trim is not white and it's not ivory; it's a color that looks like whipped cream," says Ramey. The red door adds major zing. "It's how I direct people here: 'I'm halfway up the street, the house with the red door.'"

From: HGTV Magazine

Stairway

Pictures lined the stairs in Ramey's childhood home, so she wanted to re-create the look. "You don't have to measure everything out. Just hang things where you think they look good to you," she says.

From: HGTV Magazine

Table Skirt Trim + Geometric Carpet + Cream Walls

On the stairs, Ramey added a hard-wearing wool runner with a geometric print in the same colors as the house's exterior. "How can anything not go with gray and white?" she says. To prove her point, she added green and color with a skirted console table that hides candles and other accessories beneath it.

From: HGTV Magazine

Family Room: Floral Curtains + Striped Sofa + Orange and Green

The curtains were the starting point for this room, where Hayden, 7, and Eliza, 5, hang out the most. The rug and striped sofa share the same hues as the curtains (try matching colors, not patterns), and a chartreuse chandelier makes the cut after it's fitted with coffee-color shades.

From: HGTV Magazine

Living Room

"I found the rug on a trip to Los Angeles, stored it in the garage for more than a year, then decorated the room around my memory of what it looked like," says Ramey. "Luckily, when we unrolled the carpet, it was just as I remembered!"

From: HGTV Magazine

Trellis Curtains + Velvet Sofa + Floral Chairs + Taupe Walls

Ramey tied the room together with a pop of rusty red in a lampshade. She lightened up the room with a soft-blue velvet sofa. The flora club chairs round out the combo, since they echo the blue and brown tones, too.

From: HGTV Magazine

Eliza's Room

The dresser, which Ramey found at a vintage shop in Florida, got the pink ball rolling. The headboards were a garage sale find that Ramey's mother, an artist, painted with a monkey pattern.

From: HGTV Magazine

Crisscross Quilts + Dotty Bed Skirts + Coral

Eliza picked out the crisscross quilts herself. They're modern but still kid-like, so they're easy to grow with. The bed skirts have pleats at the corners and are tied with pink ribbon. Ramey painted the pagoda-frame mirror, which belonged to her grandmother, a coral pink. "It's pretty mod-looking," she says. "I love that my grandmother was so cool."

From: HGTV Magazine

Dining Room

Ramey used a favorite decorator trick on her floor-to-ceiling curtains. "The stripes are supposed to hang vertically, but we rotated the fabric so they're horizontal instead," she says. "Horizontal stripes are easier to live with in a small room."

From: HGTV Magazine

Red Grass Cloth + Stripes + Leopard Print + Green Chairs

She pulled the raspberry color from the curtains and covered the walls in grass cloth dyed to match. And where did that green for the chairs come from? It's not totally random: "It's actually the same green that's in the rug," she says. As for the leopard-print seats, "I knew that fabric would wear like iron."

From: HGTV Magazine

Kitchen

The real bursts of color in Ramey's kitchen come from Hayden's and Eliza's artwork. "I hang their pictures with painter's tape on the cabinets and the fridge," says Ramey. "They get rotated every couple of months. Sometimes it's hard to get them to take one down if they think it's a masterpiece."

From: HGTV Magazine

Limestone + Walnut + Blue and Green

The whole look was created around the blue-gray limestone floors and countertops, which Ramey had sealed to prevent liquid from seeping in. The ceramic tile backsplash has a pale aqua glaze that picks up the color on the wall, and the island is topped with dark walnut to balance out all those cool hues. There's not much wall space, but the little there is got a coat of bluish green.

From: HGTV Magazine

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