| Beige, bone, sand, tan, khaki, cream, vanilla, camel, | | | | delicate touch of contrast. |
| wheat - these are shades of the same beige, and | | | | Tip # 2 With beige, you need white, something that's |
| they're the most popular color palette among | | | | dark, tiny bits of color, texture, and deliberate |
| Americans. It might be that Americans as a people | | | | understatement. |
| simply love neutral colors as they love the iconic | | | | Remember that the lack of color draws your eye to |
| apple pie. It might also simply be, as some home | | | | that which has color. If this other color is provided by |
| decorating experts suspect, because of fear of | | | | your wooden armoire or floor, your eyes will be |
| committing color combination errors, making their | | | | drawn to them, and you need to exaggerate the |
| choice of beige really a default choice. | | | | color in the grains, stain them to contrast with each |
| Some experts like one design guru and TV hostess | | | | other. If your walls are also white, you need |
| pin the blame on builders, paint manufacturers, and | | | | something there. Choose a finely detailed artwork-it's |
| retailers for creating generations of Americans | | | | perfect against the minimalist background. A sisal area |
| believing there are no other "safe" color options- it's | | | | rug, with its visual texture, will nicely round off the |
| all right to use other colors provided these are | | | | room décor. |
| woven around white: bluey off-white, peachy | | | | Tip # 3 Whites love geometry. |
| off-white, yellowy off-white, etc. You need to paint | | | | Perk up your off-white bedroom by painting wide |
| a room? Off-white is the automatic recommendation. | | | | vertical stripes on one wall, having faux brick on a |
| Warm. Easy. And SAFE. Paint manufacturers and | | | | small section of another, and having checks and plaids |
| retailers rushed to fill soaring demand, until shelves | | | | for your throws and slipcovers. |
| became full of nothing else. The result is an America | | | | Tip # 4 Yours is a bathroom, not a clinic. |
| hooked on only one color palette: neutrals. | | | | White is okay in a bathroom. That's one place where |
| Decorators are trying to wean Americans, trying to | | | | you keep clean, and white's clean. But if you have |
| draw them out of their safe conches, but if you're | | | | white toilet fixtures, white lavatory, shiny white tiles, |
| one who'd rather remain with neutrals, here are some | | | | white walls, white ceilings, you might end up a |
| tips for you: | | | | nervous wreck. What to do? Add texture. You might |
| Tip # 1 Remember that, in a monochromatic color | | | | have bamboo-weave baskets to hold your toiletries |
| scheme, the eye is drawn to whatever isn't the color. | | | | and towels. Or how about a seashell mosaic along a |
| With beige walls, white ceiling, and sand upholstery, | | | | thin stretch of your bathroom wall? |
| the eye will be drawn to anything that's of a | | | | Tip # 5 Remember that when there's no light, white |
| different color-the vermillion metal wall wine art, for | | | | will appear dingy. |
| instance, or even just a simple vase of purple garden | | | | Consider painting the wall or the ceiling tan or |
| flowers. When your eyes do, you pick up the | | | | brownish gray. |
| detail-the texture, the patterns, the bulk. That's when | | | | Tip # 6 Provide for winter. |
| you should take care that the other color doesn't | | | | Winter can be particularly dreary for an off-white |
| overwhelm. The vermillion iron wall art is good-the | | | | room without natural light. You can actually hasten |
| neutral color scheme shows it off just as you'd want | | | | spring by splashing tiny bits of color, as when you |
| it to, but, if vermillion is repeated in the faux fur area | | | | introduce tiny explosions of color in the floral pattern |
| rug, it can suffocate. Remember to sprinkle a more | | | | of your slipcovers. |