Pantone's Color of the Year and 6 Colors I'd Never Paint My Walls

Pantone’s Color of the Year 2024 was just announced and it is peach.

Peach Fuzz to be exact!

I have to say, I’ve been wanting to write a post on wall paint colors I’d never use, but I’ve been sitting on that for awhile. I mean, a designer should never say never because, sure enough, the next project will involve that thing they just said “never” about.

So, I’m going out on a limb here, hoping I don’t have to eat my words. :-)

Everyone has personal favorites, but I find these hard to use. I’ve had personal experience with most of them where I either saw them overused in my area or lived through their overuse in a past era.

1) Peach

This color reminds me of grandma colors, peach and seafoam green in a cabbage rose pattern. Ugh…..I just can’t.

It also reminds me of our rental house in Norway, where we lived for 3 years when our kids were young.

When my husband rented it in a preview business trip, it was all painted a kind of light taupe inside. He knew I was sensitive to the interiors and the paint color would be something I’d be picky about.

I did not mind the taupe look at all, I’m a taupe girl, for sure.

However, when we arrived and unlocked the doors to our home, the whole house had been painted a light peach. Kind of a “peach fuzz” color.

I seriously about died. I’m sure I cried. I made my husband promise me we would paint it even if we had to paint it back when we left.

We did go taupe as well as few colors in the kids’ bedrooms, but that initial let-down will be with me as my big “Welcome to Norway” that was really hard to take.

(And for the record, no one else we knew in Norway had peach walls. It was likely some cheap paint the landlord got hold of.)

2) Mauve

Mauve is not on my go-to list of wall paint colors.

Okay, I’m showing my age here, but I worked through the 80’s as a young designer and mauve and gray with a post modern style was all the rage.

I did even attempt to bring some mauve into my home in my bedroom back then with some fabrics, but it didn’t last.

It felt trendy to me then and still feels like a color that doesn’t appeal to most. While I can do a soft blush on walls (and have), when it gets into the mauve range…..I wince.

3) Baby PooP Brown

I recently saw a very popular influencer on Instagram paint her bedroom this color but a little darker.

I understand the moody look people are going for these days, but honestly, I can’t think of anything more depressing to wake up to in the morning than baby poop brown.

I did look up the normal color of baby poop on the Pampers website. Yep, I did remember it correctly.

I for one, love a light, soft bedroom color and I’m so glad I had Sherwin Williams’ Queen Anne’s Lace to wake up to every morning while recuperating from my knee replacement. I opened all the shutters at my windows and it felt like I was in an extension of my garden and was oh-so-soothing.

So why do I hate this “baby poop” color so much?

When we first moved into our house, this color was in the dining room and front rooms of the home. “Faux Tuscan” was very popular then along with all the golds.

We painted over it ourselves and it quickly became a joke, as we were not that good at cutting in at the mouldings.

We’d go back and inspect the lines at the mouldings and cry out “BABY POOP” when we would see a streak of it showing up that still needed to be painted over.

I’ll never get that out of my mind, how much I hated that color and those streaks we had to touch up. I would think if you had children, you really wouldn’t want this color on your walls.

4) Bold Red

Bold red on a wall is a big statment.

A bold, cool red was my grandmother’s favorite color. She wore it as lipstick and liked buying things in this color.

I have to say, I was never a fan.

I believe I was somewhat influenced by my mother who sort of hinted that this was the color of a bordello. :-)

This color was very eye-catching in the Global Views showroom at Highpoint Market in 2022, but I would never design with this bold color unless I was getting paid a lot of money.

A bold red in a showroom at Highpoint Market

I had a client that loved bold colors like red and we ended up doing a rusty red in her powder room. It worked for her aesthetic, but I’d probably never do it again.

I have to say though, I do love decorating with a bold red at Christmas! :-)

5) Pepto Pink

I didn’t get the bold pink Barbie thing. Everytime I see a color near Pepto Bismal, I revolt.

I just think there are a lot prettier colors of pink for your walls (although not mauve either :-).

6) SW Kilim Beige

Sherwin Williams Kilim Beige

This color was used by builders all over our suburb, inside and out. It was one of THE go-to paint colors for walls.

We had it on the exterior trim of our house, and with our terracotta colored brick, it made our house look peach.

And now you know how I feel about peach. :-/

This color never felt good to me. It was disguised as a neutral but really had a pancake make-up kind of look to it. I’ve painted over it in lots of projects, including my own house exterior which is now one of my favorite beiges that looks great with terracotta, SW Accessible Beige.

---

Now, don’t get me wrong. I think you can make these colors look good and I know there are people out there who can use these successfully in a space.

It won’t be me though, painting these on walls. :-)

As you can see, with most of these colors, I have some kind of personal situation that turned me against them.

Do you have colors that repel you? Some color tone you would never use on your walls?

See more posts on picking paint colors below!

This blogpost was thoughtfully written by me, Carla Aston, and not by AI, ghostwriters, or guest posters.