So, you’ve made the decision to invest in your Hartford’s home curb appeal and energy efficiency with durable, long-lasting vinyl siding. Or, maybe you’re building a new home and are in the process of finding the best siding to enhance your home’s appearance. Whichever the case, it’s crucial to reach a firm decision that both suits your tastes and fits your home well, because your durable vinyl siding choice will continue to grace your home for years to come.
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Color Is One of the Most Important Siding Choices You Can Make
With that in mind, there are a number of decisions to make when it comes to the appearance of your siding. However, the most significant is likely the color, as your home’s color can drastically alter its appearance. In fact, the color of a home’s siding can impact how you feel about your home as well as its overall value – so making a good color decision is vital.
When chosen well, your Hartford’s home color can boost curb appeal, as well as give it some personality. However, you’ll also want to consider colors that mesh well with the rest of the neighborhood – and leave you feeling positive about the exterior appearance of your home. If you’re not sure where to begin when it comes to making the best color decision for your home, consider following this brief set of steps.
- Tour your Hartford neighborhood Looking at other homes in your neighborhood can provide you with some loose color guidelines to begin your home search. Note homes that stand out, either positively or negatively, and determine what it is about the color combinations your neighbors have used that either speaks to you or turns you off. Then, note common color palettes used for homes in your neighborhood. For example, if many of the homes in your neighborhood are muted shades of greys, browns, and whites, choosing a bright hue for your home can make it stand out. While standing out can be a good thing – especially if you live in a quirky neighborhood with the occasional fun color palette – it can also detract from your home’s resale value. If you plan on selling within the lifespan of your vinyl siding, it’s important to choose a color that meshes well with your neighborhood.
- Consult local rules and regulations. If you live in a neighborhood with a homeowner’s association (HOA), you’re likely already well-versed on the potential pitfalls of choosing a siding color that does not adhere to the guidelines. However, if you’re building in a new area or are otherwise unfamiliar with HOA guidelines, now is a good time to ensure your ideal color combinations are a possibility. In addition, if you live in a historic area, or if your home is considered part of a larger grouping of architecturally significant homes, there are likely color restrictions in place.
- Consider your Hartford home’s architecture. Speaking of architecture, even if there are no actual regulations in place regarding the paint color for your house’s architectural style, many home styles were created with an ideal palette of colors in mind. Considering these can give you a good starting point when it comes to choosing your color scheme:
- Traditional homes, the most commonly used architectural style for new construction, are often finished in hues of warm gray, including gray-brown and gray-red, with neutral trim.
- Colonial homes often utilize white siding with black shutters and warm brick tones.
- Victorian homes traditionally utilize a bold color palette with plenty of detail colors
- Cape Cod-style homes are usually finished in tones of blue, gray, and white.
- Contemporary or modern homes tend to mix siding with other elements like stone and concrete, utilizing a neutral color palette.
- Consider your roof’s color. Depending on when you last replaced your roof – as well as the materials used – your roof could last 50 years or more. As such, it’s an important color factor that influences the overall color palette of your home. A dark roof color may look best when contrasted with a light or neutral siding color, while a lighter-colored roof may allow you to choose a bolder siding color.
- Correspond color with siding profile. Whether you’re building a new home or updating your traditional or contemporary home, many people choose to utilize multiple siding profiles to enhance the character of the home. Then, the way the siding profile is finished adds even more depth and personality. If you’ve chosen to play with multiple siding profiles, consider color choices that fit them; for example, farmhouse style siding looks great in light, neutral colors while a bolder, rougher choice deserves a deeper, contrasting color.
- Don’t forget to take size into account. Once you’ve landed on a few ideal colors for your siding, consider the size of your home. A color that looks rich and deep on a small color swatch can look garish and bright on a larger home. However, a light or neutral shade can cause a smaller home to fade into the neighborhood. Try a color swatch program to see how your chosen color might look on a larger surface.
- Determine how your chosen color looks at various times. Siding colors are a funny thing – they can appear dramatically different at different times of the day, during sunrise or sunset, in cloudy weather, full sun, and more. If you’re replacing your current siding, you can consider painting sample areas in a few areas of your home and viewing them under different conditions. Or, take your color swatch outside and apply it to your home at various times to get a better sense of what the color will look like.
Choose an Attractive Color Palette for Your Home
Of course, the color choices don’t end with your vinyl siding. Once you’ve chosen your ideal siding color, it’s time to find complementary or contrasting colors for your trim, shutters, doors, soffits, railings, and other architectural details. In addition, if you’ve chosen multiple siding profiles, you may want to accent certain areas of your home with a complementary siding color.
In general, choose lighter colors for broad areas of your Hartford home and features you want to recede into the background, and darker colors for areas you want to draw attention to. Then, select a single, bolder accent color for some smaller features of your home. When in doubt, consult with your local siding contractor for a complete selection of available vinyl siding colors and suggested accents that will help you ensure your home is appealing to the eye for years to come.