What colour shall I paint my decking?

[Mugsandpens]

Moved into this house a couple of years ago and when I say everything was painted grey, I am not joking.

We have been slowly de-greying and repainting everything but the garden has a huge expanse of mid-grey decking that patio doors open onto.
I really hate it. It’s such a joy-sucking colour and just does not work in a garden.

I’ve been trying to strip the paint but took months last year to do less than a third of it and it was really, really difficult. I have to admit defeat and think about repainting instead of stripping.

I did think black as that really brings out the colour of the plants but probably too hot in the summer with heat retention.

Maybe green? Would love some ideas or pictures!

I also have a fence and a shed that I would probably paint the same colour.

I’d probably go with black. I have a tatty rendered wall in my garden which I’m itching to paint black because, as you say, it makes a dramatic backdrop to the plants.

I don’t have a suggestion but I heard from an artist that you should avoid green paint, furniture etc. outdoors. Against all the natural shades of green, any ‘artificial’ shade automatically looks wrong. Despite my user name I’ve always followed this advice!

Why don’t you paint it beige and brighten it all up with coloured pots . To me black would feel as depressing as grey .

I love green but agee with the advice @Greeniscalming was given, it’s best avoided outside. Black would certainly work and deep anthracite would give the same effect as black but slightly less harsh. It’d be fine although maybe likely to look dated already.

how about a really deep navy?

posted too soon!

could you post some photos or a diagram. I really wonder if painting EVERYTHING one dark colour is the way forward THB. I mean, what ever you do will be better than the gray of doom, but it’d be fab it you could actually make it lovely

I love anthracite, although I’m not sure I would use it if I was trying to get rid of grey from my life and decking. Dark navy could be good.

I have trellis and other things painted that light sage green that was ubiquitous a few years ago. It looks good (to me, anyway) but I agree about avoiding bottle green or anything that looks like a near-miss for a leaf colour.

I'd go with dark oak rather than black. It goes really well with plants, blends into the background and looks natural.

I agree with all your comments 😂
I think the anthracite would be good in a smaller area but this area of decking is quite big. I've aready removed 3 square meters of it and put in a flower bed, and still have 5 square metres left so probably a bit too much grey for me still!

I had started removing the paint but it's so so hard getting out of all the grooves. Maybe I just continue with that and go with the dark oak as suggested above. I had stained my shed what I thought was an oak stain but it turned out to look like brown paint so is actually not very attracive now. This is not going very well, is it? 😂

If the boards are painted on one side, unscrew, flip and relay them?