Paint Color Trends: Coral and Clay

Every year the paint and color trend companies release their ‘Colors of the Year’ and I've just been looking at the colors for 2019. Of course, the new colors chosen each year don't mean that we all want to redecorate and change our color scheme overnight! But they sometimes give me new inspiration, shaking up my ideas on how I could use different colors, either on my walls or as a decorative accent.

Paint Color Trends

Many of the paint Colors of the Year fall into a palette of coral and clay tones. Let's take a look at them, starting with Pantone's Living Coral color, a bold pinky orange.

Here's the Living Coral color in a bedroom in New York. Pantone describes Living Coral as “An animating and life-affirming coral hue with a golden undertone that energizes and enlivens with a softer edge.” Certainly this bedroom looks cozy and inviting, and the warm coral color goes well with the traditional decor and wood furniture.

Earthen Trail is Pratt & Lambert's color of the year. The soft terracotta is quite similar in nature to the Pantone shade.

Both of these colors, Earthen Trail and Living Coral, have a sun-kissed quality to them that make them quite cheerful colors.

Strong Paint Colors

If they are too strong to use on every wall in a room, you can think about using them on feature walls, architectural features, doors, or as outside colors on your patio or deck.

Or choose accent pieces in furniture and home decor, like this gorgeous Trade Winds coral wall mirror, with a painted mahogany frame.

Sherwin-Williams has also chosen a warm terracotta for its color of the year in 2019, and they call it Cavern Clay. This moody brown evokes the desert Southwest and has an earthiness that can look either refined or casual.

More Paint Color Trends

Cavern Clay in the dining room makes a great color that offers more oomph and warmth than a lighter neutral like white or gray, but is still subtle and sophisticated to create a backdrop for elegant dinner parties!

Spice of Life by Dunn-Edwards continues the earthy warm tones that have been chosen as colors of the year, and this is the boldest of the bunch!

Spice of Life is a vibrant fire brick red / brown with orange undertones. "Spice of Life is an outgoing, confident hue that adds drama and stimulates the senses,” according to Dunn-Edwards. Traditional interiors will make the most of this intense color when teaming it with khaki tones, deep blue or cream. For a more contemporary look, pair it with crisp white, cool grays and black.

In my next post, I'll look at some of the cooler blue, green and gray tones popular right now. But till then, what do you think of these coral and 2019 colors of the year?