42 
House & 
Garden 
THE PAINT FINISH OF WALLS 
How to Select Colors—The Mechanics of Antiquing and Stippling — 
The Effects of Day and Artificial Light on Paint 
JAMES E. DURHAM 
I T should be borne in mind that while ever}" 
room in your house may be given a dif¬ 
ferent color treatment, each should blend har¬ 
moniously with the others. 
Look at the landscape and you will find 
that the wild flowers blend together in perfect 
harmony because their colors are too pro¬ 
nounced. No matter how vivid the coloring 
of individual wild flowers, each is grayed down 
to a point where it blends perfectly with all 
other wild flower colorings, although it may 
appear to have great depth of color when seen 
alone. 
Follow this suggestion: Gray 
down the colors you select for your 
various rooms, and absolute harmony 
of the whole will obtain. 
Now, when I speak of graying a 
color, I do not mean that white or 
black must be added. Some people 
think that gray paints are made by 
mixing w'hite and black. As a mat¬ 
ter of fact, many gray paints do not 
contain a trace of black—the gray 
being produced by adding to the 
white one of the umber shades. 
Graying is produced by adding 
another color; but a green may be 
grayed by the addition of red, and 
a red is grayed when green is added. 
Thus a duotone is produced; and a 
duotone is always a gray-tone. 
Selecting the Colors 
The most popular covering for 
walls is the ready-mixed flat paint, 
of which there are many brands on 
the market. It comes in all colors 
and gives to a wall that soft, dull, 
velvety richness that forms the ideal 
background for the furniture and 
furnishings. It is easily cleaned by 
washing with warm water and a 
soap free from alkali. 
As in everything else, different 
people have different color prefer¬ 
ences; some people are violently af¬ 
fected by red and purple shades. 
Yet it is possible toAreat a wall 
with a color that your friend may 
dislike, but which in this instance 
will incite his instant admiration. 
The secret lies in the application of 
nature’s basic principle; the gray-tone removes 
any real or fancied offensiveness because it 
introduces the element of repose. 
Generally, the hall and living room are given 
first consideration, the predominating colors 
for these being the soft shades of green, blue, 
yellow and tan. Bedrooms should be treated 
in lighter and airy shades such as pink, sky- 
blue, green or gray. The library and dining 
room, being more formal and masculine, may 
be painted stronger and richer colors, such as 
darker shades of green, blue and brown. The 
new “toast color” is very" appropriate here. 
Day and Artificial Light 
The exposure of the room to be painted is a 
vital element that must also be given due con¬ 
sideration if proper results are to be obtained. 
For instance, a room with a southern or 
western exposure receives an abundance of 
soft, warm sunlight, and its walls should be 
painted with the cooler shades of blue, green 
or light yellow. 
The room with a northern exposure receives 
no sun, and the “chilled” light to which it is 
subjected must be mellowed with a warm col¬ 
oring on the walls. Therefore, you should 
use those colors that suggest the sunshine— 
rose, golden brown, tan and orange. 
As the arc of soft sunlight extends from the 
South to the West, so does the arc of pure day¬ 
light extend almost to the East; which simply 
means that a room with a northwestern (or 
even a due eastern) exposure should have warm 
wall colorings, while that with a southwestern 
exposure calls for cooler colors. It is this con¬ 
trast that produces the subtle charm. 
One must remember that these rooms are to 
be illumined also by artificial light, which 
often changes the wall color entirely. For in¬ 
stance, if a room has walls of blue and is 
lighted at night by a yellow jet or bulb, the 
walls will appear green. The application of 
yellow light is the same as laying another color 
over the blue; and a mixture of yellow and 
blue always produces green. The sunlight, 
how'ever, will not change the value of any color. 
Again, if a room is darker than the average 
and the owner wants to secure the same color 
as that shown on a color card, it will be neces¬ 
sary to lighten the paint several shades in order 
to produce that color. This because color val¬ 
ues reflect back from wall to wall, and if a 
pronounced color is used as it comes from the 
can, the walls will appear several shades dark¬ 
er than the shade on the color chip. 
Lightening the color to produce the correct 
effect must be done by and left to the judg¬ 
ment of the decorator, whose past experience 
will be his best guide. 
One word more about the artificial 
lighting. No matter what color your 
walls, don’t paint the ceiling a pure 
white. Rather use ivory, as this 
shade is nearer to the artificial light¬ 
ing color, and will hold your color 
values truer. 
Better still, paint the ceiling with 
a mixture of one part of the wall 
color to eight parts of white. Then 
install an indirect lighting bowl with 
a bulb that produces a white day¬ 
light effect. The rays of light, be¬ 
ing thrown upward to the ceiling 
will reflect down on the walls the 
tint of color in the ceiling, eliminat¬ 
ing any possibility of distorting the 
color value of the room as a whole. 
Antiquing 
In “antiquing,” it is first neces¬ 
sary to bring the wall up to a finish 
with a flat paint in the same man¬ 
ner as you would normally finish 
your wall if you were going to glaze 
over it. Allow it to become perfectly 
dry. 
Then the wall should be glazed 
with a prepared glazing liquid, 
which has first been tinted to the 
desired shade with colors ground in 
oil. These may be obtained at any 
paint store either in a tube or by 
the pound. 
Most walls that are antiqued to¬ 
day are stippled, and the amount of 
wall space covered at a time with 
the glazing liquid depends upon the 
figure that you wish to acquire on 
the wall. In other words, it is not 
safe to apply the glazing liquid over 
the whole wall before beginning to stipple or 
figure it. 
Just a little at a time is the better way to 
do it, then apply another bit of the glazing 
liquid to the wall before proceeding again. 
If an absolutely uniform figure is desired, 
it is best to apply the liquid quickly all over 
the wall, allowing a certain time for setting, 
and then stipple or figure wdth the prepared 
figuring material. 
Upon completing the glazing of the wall, if 
a unifonn texture of finish is not secured 
throughout, you may apply over the glazing 
liquid (after it has dried) a flat finish which, 
when dry, will produce a uniform finish. 
Straight stippling is done with a brush 4" 
by 6" or 4" by 8" in size, the bristles being at 
{Continued on page 64) 
FROM A CAR WINDOW 
Dipping poles through the framing glass, 
Little woodlands that flash and pass, 
Trees and water, and brown leaves falling. 
Children playing and woodbirds calling. 
Scarlet roofs of a busy town. 
Swift cars threading it up and down. 
Red leaves wound on a graveyard wall, 
Gleaming ponds and a waterfall; 
Swift the train on the flying track — 
I go forward; but all goes back; 
Back the towns and the reach of blue; 
All my heart and my thought go, too. 
Back to the faces sad and kind. 
Back to the house I have left behind! 
-M.4RGARET WiDDEXIER. 
