Retro kitchen paint color schemes from 1953
Mid Mod Pam on Nov 08 2008 at 8:00 am | Filed under: kitchen, paint colors
Following up on yesterday’s post about Nancy’s (popular!) kitchen project… and on our Monday blue Television Kitchen… here are kitchen cabinet paint colors straight out of 1953. Lots of good mix-and-match ideas.
I do want to point out that with two-tone kitchen cabinet combinations, you want your darker color on the bottom to ground or anchor the design. It’s interesting to study the color combo’s below - for their use of harmony … and contrast. Honestly, study these things - and over time your design-eye will sharpen! I do think there’s some innate ‘talent’ in design - but like most other pursuits, it’s 99% perspiration! Work hard, study hard, and your ‘instinct’ (and ‘luck’) will get better, ha.
Floors can be light or dark - one guide might be whether you want to bring sunshine (light) into the kitchen, or coziness (medium/dark).
One of the tips you also see written about a lot in the 50s - as everyone was learning to decorate, together — was to choose your principal color scheme based on the direction the room faced. That is, south- and western-facing kitchens will get a lot of sunlight — they will be “hot” — so to counter that, choose ‘cool’ colors… colors in the blue/cool spectrum. North-facing kitchens tend to feel “cold” because of the quality of the sunlight — so use red/hot colors there, to warm things up. Eastern-facing: flexible, ahhh… that morning sunshine! I’ll look for some info on this issue and feature more, in the future.
Pam- You have answered a question that we have had. Our kitchen colors are beautiful (we think)- tone on tone aquamarine with the darker color on some of the bottom cabinets. Having the little deeper color really makes the kitchen much more interesting. Adding the splash of red that we have done w/ fridge & dishwasher really sets everything off. Down the road we will have to decide how to go w/ new floor & cabinet top.
Nancy
Thanks for posting this Pam… It is a great illustration of “acceptable” 1950’s options for kichen cabinet colors - including natural wood, mixed with color.
Ours is closest to the next to the last one as we left the original cabinets as is; I cannot bring myself to paint them. They removed the original countertop (grrrr), but it is still that color in that example above. It is that CRAPPY faux wood formica. UGH. Which might be tolerable if I could put that metal around the edges to just fake the look.