Decorating north facing rooms

[Perfidy]

They are lovely large period, 1920s rooms, but get very little light apart from the morning. Living room and dining room.

Any tips?

We moved in recently so are starting from scratch.

Bump

Any pics to have a starting point to help? Do you want a period or contemporary feel? Formal or informal? Likes or dislikes in terms of colours?

What sort of lighting are you going for? The way your room is lit has more influence than can be expected.

The F&B website has some good advice on which colours suit directions of rooms like north. A lot of advice i have seen suggest you wont turn it into a bright sunny room with paint so they say use dark colours and work with if and make it cosy.
I would say that i am not slways sold on dark and cosy but certainly stronger colours can be seen better that pale ones and white can just look dreary grey.

Warm colours, warm lighting.

my dark north facing snug is now super snuggly using dark colours. It was never going to be a light room even when it was painted white.

I have farrow and ball plummet (Dark grey) in a north facing bedroom and really like it.

I'm really struggling with this. Our master bedroom and living room are both north facing but actually quite light and airy so I'm reluctant to go dark even though I love that look. But no idea what else would work.

Our previous house had light north facing room and we went for a cream and liked it. There’s much less light here though and I’m struggling a bit.

Dulux do a range called Light and Space I think. It reflects light and I really liked it in our old flat. I think the main trick is to keep tones warm though (regardless of whether you go for light or dark colours). Use mirrors and think of lighting. One overhead light in the centre of the room is usually a terrible option. Lamps on side tables, lights to light up shelves or artwork can really make a big difference.

We need to get tbe lighting right. I'm not keen on the current arrangement. I think once we have freshener the painting up that'll make a big difference.

We have a north facing period lounge that I always painted in light colours as it's north facing .. I took the plunge and painted it in farrow and ball light blue and it looks amazing!! Lamp room oval or pigeon are also nice - defo a solid colour

I used to get so obsessed with which colours ‘can’ & ‘can’t’ be used in our north rooms. A lot was from f&b website.

But now I just choose the shade I like...paint a large sample on card & see if I like it. It’s that simple. Choose a few colours you like & go from there

Another vote for the Dulux Light & Space range here. We painted our former north facing living room in Coastal Glow, and our bedroom in Morning Light which are both from this range, and it helped so much. I’d also second the comment about lighting; uplighters and two or three lamps will transform the feel of the space. Also, never underestimate the power of a whacking great mirror on a wall perpendicular the the window! It completely changes the way the light bounces about the room.

Another vote for dulux light & space, it reflects light. Works a treat! Try and put a large mirror on a wall that does get light (if that’s possible).

We tried a load of colours in our North facing bedroom and they all felt really cold and uncosy. Then in a fit of inspiration I painted it a dusky pink. DH took some persuading but he agrees that it's the only colour we've tried that felt cosy! So think outside your comfort zone (I'm not normally a pink person but in this case it works v well).

Dusky pink. Nice. What do you accessorise with?

We've got light wood furniture, and the curtains are a warm dark brown colour to make it a bit less pink iyswim

It's very snuggly

Think furniture is ash

Dulux burnt autumn 4

3 of our North facing rooms are painted in F&B French Grey (actually a period green really) Ammonite, and the smallest in Stiffkey blue (basically navy) . All have white ceilings and woodwork and all look equally fantastic. The Ammonite is quite "light" but I had it in a South facing room in another smaller property and it appeared to take a different tone again in natural light.
If you can have white ceilings and woodwork you could really get away with absolutely any colour here. The Stiffkey blue is magnificent if you fancied it. So rich it makes the room warm.

Our kitchen units are Stiffkey Blue, it's a lovely colour.

Hi Perfidy, just to add that when I was mooching around the Farrow and Ball website today at their new 'Colour by Nature' range I stumbled across 'Orange Coloured White' which they describe as good for north facing rooms.

Great thank you. I'll have a look.

That orange coloured white looks suspiciously like magnolia to me...
I've had F&B Calluna in a north facing bedroom and it was gorgeous. And a deep orange red in a north facing small sitting room, (little greene's Drummond, maybe? Or heat?) which was rich and lovely.