You are welcome at our paint counter, and we are glad to help with Benjamin Moore paint for your home in Wellesley, MA. Bring a room, a whole floor or a list of every space in the house, and we will work through colour, sheen and order of work with you, one decision at a time.
Why Wellesley’s colonials and shingle-style houses need careful colour
Much of the housing stock in Wellesley is older colonial and shingle-style construction, built on a generous scale, and both types bring the same challenge to a paint project: a lot of rooms, a lot of windows, and a lot of trim. A house with a high window count has more casings, sills, sashes and aprons than most, and every one of them is a surface that has to agree with the wall beside it.
Light is the other half of it. In a house with windows on every side, a single wall colour can look warm in the morning room and cool in the study at the back. Shingle-style interiors often run into one another through wide openings and stair halls, so you see three or four rooms at once from the front door. A colour that is chosen for one room alone tends to look wrong from the hall.
Whole-house work is the usual case here
In homes of this size, painting rarely stops at one room. It is common for a Wellesley project to run through every bedroom, or across the whole ground floor, or through the house from top to bottom. That changes the job. You are not choosing a colour, you are choosing a palette that holds together across many rooms, with one trim white or a small family of them, and a sensible order for the work.
Many projects already have a designer
Projects in these houses often come with an interior designer’s plan or schedule already in place. If yours does, bring it in. We can work from the designer’s colour selections and help you match the paint to the fabrics and wallpaper they have chosen, so the plan arrives on the wall as it was drawn.
What you will find at our Benjamin Moore counter
Interior paint
Benjamin Moore interior paint for walls, ceilings and trim, mixed at our counter in Natick. We help you choose a sheen for each surface as well as the colour.
Exterior paint and stains
Benjamin Moore exterior paints and stains for clapboard, shingle, doors and trim. Shingle-style houses raise their own questions about stain and paint, and we are glad to talk them through.
Colour help that sees the whole room
We spend our days putting paint next to fabric and wallpaper. Bring a cushion, a swatch, a tile or a photo, and we will help you find colours that sit well beside it.
Paint chosen with everything else
Window treatments, drapery fabric, wallpaper, paint and flooring are all sold here. That lets one person look at a whole room, not just one surface of it.
Choosing colour for a house with many windows
A room with windows on three sides behaves differently from a room with one. The light is brighter, it shifts more across the day, and the walls between windows are narrow strips rather than broad planes. Here is how we usually work through that with you.
Start with the light, not the chip
A colour card held up at the counter shows you very little. The same Benjamin Moore colour can look clean and pale in a south-facing living room and dull and grey in a north-facing hall. When you come in, tell us which way the main windows face and what the room looks like at the time of day you use it most. That narrows the field quickly.
We always suggest testing a short list on the wall itself before you commit. Paint a good-sized patch on more than one wall, including one beside a window and one opposite it, and look at them in the morning, the afternoon and under lamps at night. In a big colonial, it is worth testing in the rooms that face different directions, because the colour you love in the front parlour may need a lighter or warmer cousin in the back of the house.
Trim, sash and casing
With a high window count, trim is a large share of what you paint. Most people want one trim colour throughout, and that is usually the right call in a house where rooms open onto each other. The question is which white, or which off-white. A bright white can look sharp against a deep wall colour and slightly blue against a warm cream. A softer white can disappear into a pale wall. We help you look at the trim colour against each of your main wall colours before you settle, so it works in every room it touches.
Sheen matters as much as colour on trim. Window sashes, sills and door casings are handled every day, so they usually take a harder-wearing, glossier finish than the walls. We will talk you through the choice for each surface, and explain what each sheen will show and hide on older woodwork.
Ceilings in tall rooms
Many older colonials have generous ceiling heights in the main rooms. A flat, bright ceiling makes a tall room feel lighter. A ceiling tinted with a little of the wall colour can make a large room feel calmer and closer. We can show you both approaches side by side.
Planning a palette for many rooms
When the job is a whole floor or a whole house, the order in which you make decisions saves a lot of second-guessing.
- Fix what is not changing. Stone, tile, wood floors, a kitchen that is staying, a rug you love, a designer’s main fabric. These set the limits.
- Choose the trim white. One trim colour carried through the house ties the rooms together.
- Pick the main rooms you see from the front door. The hall, the stair, the living room and the dining room are seen together, so they are chosen together.
- Let the private rooms go further. Bedrooms, a study or a powder room can take a stronger colour, because you see them one at a time.
- Test in the real rooms. A short list per room, painted on the wall, seen at different times of day.
We are happy to sit down with your full room list, or with your designer’s schedule, and help you build the palette room by room. If wallpaper is part of the plan for a dining room or a powder room, it is easier to choose the paint once the paper is chosen. See our wallpaper in Wellesley page for how we help with that side of it.
Rooms that need extra thought in a big older house
Some rooms in a large colonial or shingle-style home ask more of the paint than others. These are the ones we most often talk through with you.
The stair hall
A front stair in an older house is often the tallest wall in the home, seen from the ground floor, the landing and the floor above. Its colour links every level, so it is usually best chosen early, with the trim white, and kept calm enough to sit beside every room that opens off it. The walls along a stair also take knocks from bags, boxes and hands, so a finish that can be wiped is worth considering.
Kitchens, baths and back halls
Kitchens and bathrooms see steam and splashes, and a back hall or mudroom sees boots, dogs and sports bags. These rooms usually take a more durable, slightly glossier finish than a living room would. We will help you balance a finish that cleans well with one that does not show every bump in an older plaster wall.
Sunrooms and rooms with windows on every side
Many older houses have a sunroom, a porch room or a corner room with windows on three or four walls. There is very little wall left, and the light is strong, so the trim and the window treatments carry most of the look. Paint here is often chosen in the same conversation as the shades or the drapery, so they read as one.
Rooms under the eaves
Top-floor bedrooms and studies in older houses often have sloping ceilings, dormers and knee walls. Deciding where the wall stops and the ceiling starts is the main question. Carrying one colour over walls and slopes can make a room under the roof feel larger and simpler, while a contrasting ceiling makes the shape of the room stand out. We can show you how each approach looks with the colours on your list.
Dining rooms and libraries
Formal rooms in older colonials often have panelling, chair rails or built-in shelves. These are the rooms where a deeper colour or a painted ceiling tends to work best, because they are used at set times and often in lamplight. If the room has wallpaper above a chair rail, the paint below it is chosen to sit with the paper.
Getting ready to buy
Paint is ordered by the room and by the surface, so a little preparation makes the visit to the counter quicker.
- Measure each room. The length of each wall and the ceiling height are enough to start. Note the number of windows and doors.
- List the surfaces. Walls, ceiling, trim, doors and any built-ins are often painted in different sheens.
- Bring what the paint has to sit beside. A fabric swatch, a sample of wallpaper, a photo of the floor, the designer’s board.
- Note what is there now. Very dark walls, stained woodwork or old glossy finishes can change what the first coat needs to be. Tell us what you are painting over.
- Say who is doing the work. If you are painting yourself, we will talk about tools and finishes in plain terms. If a painter is doing the job, bring their questions too.
Ready to Start Your Project?
Visit our showroom on Main Street in Natick, or book a free in-home consultation and we bring the samples to you.
Coming to us in Natick, or us coming to you
You can start a Wellesley paint project in either place. Both are useful, and many projects use both.
Visiting the counter in downtown Natick
Wallpaper and paint were the whole business when our Natick shop opened in 1947, and paint is still close to its heart. The counter is where you can see colour cards, talk through sheens, and have your Benjamin Moore paint mixed. It is also where you will find the fabric books, wallpaper books and window treatment samples, so you can hold a paint colour up against the other things going into the room without making a second trip.
If you are coming in for paint, bring your measurements, your swatches and any photos of the rooms. If you would like us to have anything ready for your visit, drop us a line through the contact page before you set off, or press the call button and let us know.
A free in-home consultation
Colour is best judged in the room where it will live. Our free in-home consultation brings us to your house, where we can see the light, the floors, the furniture and the windows as they really are. In a large colonial or a shingle-style home, that visit is often the fastest way to see how rooms connect and where the palette needs to change. You can read what a visit involves on our in-home design consultation page.
Working from a designer’s plan
If you have a designer, we are glad to work alongside them. Send us the colour selections, or bring the plan to the counter, and we will match paint to the specified fabrics and wallpapers so everything is chosen to agree. It also keeps the paint, the treatments and the wallpaper coming from one place, which makes it easier to keep track of what has been ordered.
Paint as one part of a larger Wellesley project
Paint is often the last thing on the wall and the first thing people notice. In a house with many windows, the window treatments are nearly as visible as the walls, and they have to agree with them. That is why we encourage you to choose paint, treatments and wallpaper together when you can.
- See our window treatments in Wellesley page for blinds, shades and drapery for houses with high window counts.
- If the floors are changing too, our flooring in Wellesley page covers hardwood, carpet and luxury vinyl.
- For a longer look at choosing these together, read coordinating paint, wallpaper and window treatments.
- Everything we offer for homes in this town is gathered on our Wellesley page, and the full paint range is on our Benjamin Moore paint page.
Exterior colour on shingle and clapboard
Exterior colour on a shingle-style house is a different question from the interior. Shingles can be stained or painted, the trim usually carries a strong contrast, and the colour is seen against the garden and the street at a great distance. We stock Benjamin Moore exterior paints and stains and are glad to look at photos of the house with you, alongside the roof colour and the stone or brick that is staying.
Before you choose, take photos of the house in full daylight from the street and from the garden, and bring a few of the neighbouring trim and door colours you like. Exterior colours look lighter outdoors than on a card, so we often suggest testing a shade or two deeper than your first instinct.
Front doors and shutters
The front door is the one place on the outside of a big colonial where a strong colour is almost always welcome. A deep green, a navy, a black or a red can all suit a white or grey house, and the choice is easier when you can see it beside the shutters and the trim. Doors and shutters are touched and weathered more than the siding, so the finish matters as much as the colour. Bring a photo of the door in its frame, with the hardware, and we will help you test a few options against the body colour of the house.
Questions from Wellesley
Can you match paint to a fabric or wallpaper I have already chosen?
Yes, bring it in. Choosing paint beside fabric and wallpaper is what we do every day, and having the fabric and wallpaper books in the same store means we can see your sample against the options straight away. If your designer chose the fabric, bring their notes too.
We are painting most of the house. Where do we start?
Start with the things that are not changing, then choose one trim colour for the whole house, then the rooms you see together from the front door. After that, the bedrooms and smaller rooms can take more character. We are glad to go through your full room list with you at the counter or at home.
Do you come to the house to help choose colour?
Our in-home consultation is free and brings us into your rooms, where colour is far easier to judge. Get in touch through the contact page and tell us what you are planning so we can arrange a visit.
Do you sell Benjamin Moore exterior paint and stain as well as interior paint?
Yes. We stock Benjamin Moore interior paints and exterior paints and stains, so the clapboard, the shingles, the front door and the rooms inside can all come from the same counter.
Talk to us about your Wellesley paint project
Tell us about the house, the rooms on your list and anything that has already been chosen, and we will help you plan the Benjamin Moore colours from there. Use the contact page to send us a note or ask for a free in-home consultation, or tap the call button to talk to us now.