Beach Cabin: Exterior Paint Color
Buh-bye, purple beach cabin! Just kidding. Sort of. We are in the process of choosing a new exterior paint color for the cabin. I thought it might be fun to take you along for the process and (hopefully) beautiful finished product.**This post contains affiliate links, meaning that if you click and purchase, I may receive some compensation. Thank you! As always, you should try your own swatches as paint colors can vary from setting to setting.
Purple Exterior
I may have been a little dramatic calling the beach cabin purple. It is more of a gray with a purple undertone. I don’t think anyone would call it purple, but for some reason my eyes pull out the purple in every.single.thing. It’s actually quite pretty with its Nantucket Gray trim and green grids on the windows. Very cottage-y.
But, as painted wood exteriors do, it is chipping and in need of new paint. This seems like the perfect opportunity to make the cabin ours and choose a new paint color.
White Exterior Paint Color Option
Don’t be shocked, but I’ve been flip flopping like a crazy lady. I love a white cottage look and think it would go perfectly with our green grid windows. The white and green color combo feels very Maine-esque to me for some reason. Or even reminiscent of trips to Mackinac Island right here in Michigan. However, there are already some gorgeous white cabins in our neighborhood and I always have that small piece of me that wants to be a little different. But then again, this could finally be my opportunity to use Benjamin Moore White Dove!
Right Side: Benjamin Moore White Dove
Gray Option
Another classic cabin color combination is to go with a light-medium gray with white trim. As with a white color, I think the gray would go well with the green grids. I know that I shouldn’t plan around the green grids. We will likely eventually paint them too. It just wasn’t in our budget this time around. When I’ve seen exteriors in Sherwin Williams Repose Gray on Pinterest, I fall in love each and every time. I also put up a sample of my tried-and-true Benjamin Moore Horizon, which I have in our Colonial Home kitchen, powder bathroom, Tween Bedroom, and Coastal Bedroom. However, when I put up the swatch it looked like it should fall in more of the white color option category. I have read a few times that it may be necessary to go a few shades warmer for exteriors and I’m finding that to be true.
Right Side from Top: Benjamin Moore White Dove (2), Farrow & Ball Down Pipe
Exterior Paint Colors: Green-Blue Option
You may also know by now that I love a mid-toned blue/green option. Farrow & Ball’s Down Pipe is forever a favorite. I had it color-matched (ish) when I painted our cane console in the living room at the beach cabin. (Check out that project here.) I couldn’t help but put the actual Down Pipe up when I was swatching away a couple of weekends ago. (The bottom swatch is Benjamin Moore Deep River but that was a little too green for this project.)
Left Side from Top: Benjamin Moore Graphite, Soot, Deep River
Charcoal Option
Because I see undertones pretty easily, I really tried to hone in on a charcoal color with blue undertones. That led me to Benjamin Moore Soot, which then led me down the rabbit hole of beautiful charcoal exteriors and to Benjamin Moore’s Graphite. I took a poll on Instagram, and it was so close! I put swatches up on all sides of the house to see the colors in the different lights and checked in on them to see how they changed throughout the day. I also sampled the paint next to the stone on the exterior as well as next to the chimney (which we are not painting).
It’s Not Over Until It’s Over
Just like I did with our kitchen cabinets at home, I have a feeling that I’m not finished getting paint samples yet. I have current plans to order Farrow & Ball Railings and Sherwin Williams Iron Ore (both of which fall under the Charcoal Option). A friend’s shed is painted Sherwin Williams Iron Ore with Benjamin Moore Swiss Coffee trim, I just want to give it all the heart eyes. It is so good!!!
And then there is the trim. Will we go dark and more modern? Or a pure white? Or a creamy white? And which trim will we paint white and what will we have go with the main color? Fingers crossed our poor little cabin doesn’t look like a patchwork quilt while we are making all of these decisions.
