The Best Summer-Inspired Paint Colors and Combos, According to Designers

Preserve treasured summer memories in your home with these designer-favorite colors.

Summer is undeniably nostalgic. It’s the season of warm nights, carefree bike rides, grilled barbecue dinners, beach days in the sand, and napping under bright blue skies. Even as summer ends, you can preserve those cherished memories throughout your home by choosing an array of colors that evoke the season. With that in mind, we asked five designers to share their go-to paint colors that exude the essence of summer. 

Add Instant Warmth with Yellow Paint Colors

“Nothing feels more to me like a carefree, fun summer like the color yellow,” says interior designer Meta Coleman. “Yellow paint is actually a really hard one to get right. Oftentimes, it can have too much green in it and can feel too cool at night.”

For a softer yellow, Coleman prefers Benjamin Moore’s Weston Flax HC-5. For a yellow with a bit more vibrancy, try Benjamin Moore’s Hawthorn Yellow HC-4.

If you like a more muted yellow, try Farrow and Ball’s Sudbury Yellow. On a recent kitchen project, Coleman chose this soft shade of yellow for the room’s pantry. “Oftentimes, pantries can be utilitarian and bland,” she says. “This yellow pantry adds so much energy and feels fresh, yet also can be organized. Everything in its proper place.”

But yellow shouldn’t be mistaken for a niche hue. “I think it can work in any space, really,” says Coleman, who also doused the color in living rooms, pantries, bathrooms, and moldings. “I think it all depends on the application and the story you want to tell with the color.”

Either way, yellow adds instant warmth to any space. “For me, it feels like an endless summer,” she says.

Use the Perfect Summer Cottage Palette

Jesse DeSanti, the designer behind Jette Creative, says nothing defines this season more than a summer house. “The two colors that I’d honestly use the most when designing a summer house would be a crisp white, a warm cream, and some dark brown paneling,” she says. “I think of soft-white striped curtains against a white wall with French doors open and a light breeze.”

For DeSanti, summer is more like a palette, a combination of colors that speak to warm, sunshine-filled months. She loves pairing light blue and yellow, a combo that feels beachy sans the traditional nautical look. “The walls and a white and blue combo with a yellow carpet—something about the combination feels so summery and warm.”

Her go-to for pulling off the look starts with a blue, like Benjamin Moore’s Blue Puritan Gray. For white, she leans on Benjamin Moore’s White Opulence. And when it comes to yellow, her top pick is Farrow & Ball’s Hay.

Tap a Childhood Memory

“Every Saturday morning of my childhood, I was woken up by my dad mowing the backyard right outside of my bedroom,” says Jake Harrison of HubbaHubba, a Los Angeles design studio that specializes in interiors, furnishings, and objects. “So the sound of a lawnmower and the smell of fresh cut grass will always bring a wave of summer nostalgia over me.”

For Harrison, that unforgettable scent translates into a love for the green-based hue Drive-Thru Safari by Backdrop. “It’s a perfect balance of a joyful green that still has a nice dusty undertone, which keeps it from feeling too primary,” he says. “It can read modern, traditional, and anywhere between.”

To carry that memory into his own home, he coated the walls of a powder room with the fresh, green hue. “It makes me smile whenever I open the door,” says Harrison. “It’s paired with a small black and white checkered floor, which makes the green sing.”

Choose Something a Little Sweet

When Holly Heffinger, founder and lead designer of Heffinger Interiors, thinks of summer, her mind goes straight to Farrow & Ball’s Sulking Room Pink. “It’s the perfect playful pink. It’s romantic and sweet with muted rose undertones reminiscent of a playful beach umbrella wedged into the sand. This color feels very fun and carefree transporting us right into a chill summer day.”

Heffinger tapped the “not overly pink” hue for a pool bathroom. “Its warm undertones make it soft and soothing while the bold pigment brings vibrancy. We love Sulking Room Pink when applied to wall paneling and find it works well in rooms with nice natural light to highlight the rich pigment.”

Related: 39 Pink Room Decor Ideas to Use Throughout Your Home

Take a Cue from Your Favorite Time of Day

Golden Hour inspired Casey Keasler’s go-to summer shade, Farrow & Ball’s bold India Yellow. “It’s that time of day when everything glows beautifully just before sunrise or right after sunset, everything is luminous,” says Keasler, who runs the Portland, Oregon-based interior design studio Casework.

“For a yellow, it has the perfect amount of warmth and softness,” she says. “Not too vibrant but still rich and with depth that feels sophisticated and simultaneously youthful.”

Not just for clients, Keasler coated the edgy take on a cheerful hue on her back door, inside and out. “I would use it in small amounts like doors, trim, cabinets, or accents in the home, and I would pair it with a warm white,” she adds. “It has a moody undertone that could be overpowering for some.”

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