Ever since I moved into my first apartment, I was in search of just the right color that would give my rooms a cozy inviting glow. In NYC I had an unfortunate incident when I thought I was choosing a nice soothing color of the palest apricot. Once it was on the walls (and the woodwork and the moldings) I discovered that the shade resembled Silly Putty more than any kind of fruit. I lived with the color for a long long time, and it was most defintiely not glowy, nor was it terribly inviting.

In my flat in San Francisco, I experimented with more saturated tones, getting them mostly wrong. My living room came out right: a muted but saturated green called "leak leaf" looked great in the bright sunlight during the day and gathered shadows just so in the evenings. The hallway, where I thought I picked out a buttery yellow that would make my entryway as though lit by candlelight, turned out to look more like... margarine.

After my miserable failures at color picking, I took the safe route when I repainted my NYC apartment. The Silly Putty bedroom was painted over to a nice innocous white. (And yes, I labored endlessly over exactly which white would be perfect.)

Since opening the gallery, I've discovered that the path to cozy, inviting, flattering and glowy is, rather unexpectedly, gray. My friends at Dufner Heighes advised me to go for gray walls when painting the gallery. I was hesitant at first - everyone knows that gallery walls are supposed to be white! Gray has turned out to be a much better choice: work hung on the walls really pops against it, it's easier to maintain, and it makes the gallery feel different than other galleries, which is exactly what I wanted. I also picked an exterior flat premixed color (Benjamin Moore, Cliffside Gray). It's more durable than interior paint, meaning that scuffs, pencil marks and other mishaps are easily wiped away. One of the artists I represent liked it so much, she painted her whole apartment the same color.

Greg & Daniel have used different shades of gray on many residential projects. Both images in this item are from projects they've done. The top image is of a loft owned by clients we share. Since it's shot in daylight, and a bit bright, the glowiness factor is not as evident. I was at the clients' last week, which is what got me thinking about this post in the first place. We were installing a very large print of this Dana Miller photo and I was struck by how well the print was offset by their gray walls. It really made the white of the birch trees stand out and gave the browner tones a bit of extra oomph. (Their gray is also Benjamin Moore, an interior color called Conventry Gray.)

The second image is of another interior that Dufner Heighes did, and again, I think the gray works very well. Like the green color I painted my living room in SF, I love the way gray deals with light and shadow. Also, both these clients are fortunate to have a good deal of artwork to hang on their walls and gray is, in my opinion, the perfect backdrop.

After 5 years back in my NYC place, it's ready for a painting - right now the white is gathering soot and dust in its corners, and there are scuff marks galore. I can't wait to have the time and money to get it done and paint it gray.