Paint the Town Purple

Well maybe just my living room! I moved into my house in August 2002. The day we put my early American hand-me-down couch with the ecru and pastel stripped slip cover against the "real estate" ecru wall I knew that painting was in my (or my dad's) future. Since purple is my favorite color and there's a purple stripe in the slip cover, I thought the wall should be purple. Then my mom hung some blue shelves and covered them with various knick-knacks - most with sentenmential value - and the task of painting seemed too daunting. The blue shelves would not look good on the purple wall so they'd have to be painted and the project snowballed.

Then inspiration hit! I'd taken some fantastic photographs in Alaska (see them here and here, as well as in the Tetons and here in SNP. I'd take down all the knick-knacks (they just collect dust and dander and other things that make me sick) and replace them with pictures! I'd order poster size prints fron Kodak.com and just cover the walls with my own art!

I'd never embarked on such a project before. Other "home improvement" projects have been performed by my parents. They are currently enjoying their "gypsy" life and have a long list of projects for their own house so I decided I'd try this one myself. Especially after Susan painted both her basement (I can't find the link to that one!) and her mom's dining room made it look so easy! I figured that I'd do my best, learn as I go and not expect perfection the first time out.

So I made this my winter break project! I went to Lowe's and collected all the purple paint chips I could find. I settled on American Traditions "Purple Hills". I ordered 7 poster size prints of pictures of Denali. I then broke out the paint!

Sunday I painted the wall with the couch, thinking I'd stop there. I then was in a holding pattern waiting for my pictures to arrive. Other things I have ordered friom Kodak.com came in record time, not the case with my poster prints.

After I'd painted the couch wall I had a little less than half the gallon of paint left and it was burning a hole in my pocket so I had to paint more. The wall with the sliding glass door had too many things that I needed to take down and then get back up so I opted for the TV wall.

It's quite "purple". A bit more purple than I had in mind but I like it! I'm sure it will look different once I get my pictures up on it. Here are few pictures.....









I'll post "before" and "after" pictures once my pictures arrive and I get them up.

It's not a perfect paint job, but I did learn a lot about the process - I like using a brush for the edges better than the $6 ergonomic edger-tool I bought and I see why the pervious owner painted the ceilings the same color as the rest of the room!I'm already eyeing the other "real estate" ecru walls in my house (which is practically all of them!)....maybe a goldish yellow for the dining room, green for the bed room, a different green for the basement, maybe some blue in there somewhere, I also like red, I'm sure I can find something to paint red....hmmm....if I'm not careful the house will look like The Partridge Family Bus! Oh well, it's only paint, right?