HEY HEY!
So today I have a surprise for youuuu. I’m going to teach you how to create home color palettes like a pro! I want to introduce you to a site called Coolors. I use Coolors for pretty much everything. I have used it to decide on colors for my business cards, branding, website, individual blog posts, paint pairings, furniture color palettes, you name it. It is AWESOME and FREEEEEEE.
I recommend Coolors if you are trying to experiment with different color palettes, especially if you do not have a designer’s assistance…not because you aren’t capable, but because a designer has the ability to design a room in his or her mind and can see the end product before anything is even ordered. Most “normal” people cannot do that and it is a very important skill to possess when it comes to designing. Can you think of a time you tried decorating and it just didn’t come out right? Or you thought a color scheme would work and it absolutely did not? No worries, young grasshopper; I’ll help you create color home palettes like a pro.
It is very important to properly visualize colors together.
You can avoid so many issues early in the game if you are able to master the skill of visualization, either in your own mind or with visual aids. So, if you cannot visualize in your mind, this is where Coolors comes in. Even if you’re like me and can visualize, it’s nice to be able to save your palettes so you can always refer back and provide yourself with endless options. I like options.
I used to just skip this step entirely. After all, I am a designer and I can design stuff in my head. I think it was my ego forcing me to do things the hard way, even though there is nothing wrong with getting a little help. I began to learn that even seasoned pros like Emily Henderson go through SOOOO many revisions of a design. One of my professors used to say that a project is never done, you just have a deadline. Ain’t that the truth? You can spend the rest of your life working on one project, redoing it over and over and over again, and it will still never be “done”.
There are so many options to consider, so tools like Coolors help you to come up with a plan that you can save and refer back to when considering “will that go with that other thing?” and “is this color too dark next to the black?”. It’s just so much easier this way. See? Now you can create color palettes like a pro. Now if you will join me in admiring Kourtney K’s amazing office. Ahhhhh. And! I was able to use Coolors to put together a palette of her exact room colors. Color me Kardashian. Once you have mastered how to create home color palettes, you will be unstoppable in your design endeavors!
PS: This is not sponsored; I’m just honestly sharing what I use because once I found it and loved it, I had to share it.
Ok. Stay with me for this next part. In order for you to understand the importance of being able to find the exact color of anything, you need to know a little bit about what that number actually is. The number is called a hexadecimal and it is color numbering. I’ll explain simply.
Quick intro to hexadecimal (color codes):
Hexadecimal. What the HEX (hehe) is that? Hey, you said you wanted to create home color palettes like a pro, so I’m teaching you. Well, actually, you didn’t say that, but I’m delivering anyway.
Do you see how the color has a hashtag and a number? That is a hexadecimal. Hexadecimals make it easy to ensure you have the same color across all boards…think of it like Pantone, but in computer language. There are 6 digits of hexadecimals. Each digit can range from 0-9 and A-F. If black is #000000, what do you think white’s hexadecimal is? It is at the other end of our 0-9 and A-F, so it is #ffffff. Other numbers in the middle like 9 and letters like A are shades of gray. So, easily put, black at one end, white at the other, and in between are shades of gray. Easy right?
Ok, Kristen, then how are other colors made? Yeah, yeah, yeah, I knew you were smart. So when the number is the same 6 digits ie: #222222, #888888, #cccccc, etc, that is when they are shades of gray. We get colors when we start mixing the letters and numbers like #005577 is dark cerulean and #a1b2c3 is a pale blue gray.
Pro tip: Not only can you create home color palettes like a pro, you can do what I did and copy colors from Kourtney Kardashian’s house to put into my own Coolors color palette. I just imported the photo into Photoshop, used the eye dropper tool to get the values of the colors I wanted, then entered the values into Coolors for the exact colors. Does that make me famous like a Kardashian? Can I be Kristen Kardashian?
***Also, if you’re super advanced (HOLLAR!), you will notice that you are given the hexadecimal code for each color, along with its name and RGB values. This really comes in handy if you see a color you like and want to use it for other applications. You can do more with this tool than just create home color palettes. If you see a color you like, you can use it on your website, logo, business card, even digital art. Hey, I aim to please. Ya welcome.
Above is another palette from Kourtney’s house. This is of Reign’s room; isn’t it sweet? So now you can create a color palette just like Reign Dissick! Full of shades of grays and chocolates, with some awesome art. Isn’t this so fun? It really opens you up to get a color palette from the pros. There are so many great sites like House Beautiful, Architectural Digest, and Elle Decor that post amazing designs and now you can save the designs you love and create home color palettes.
Let me know in the comments if you have used Coolors, or what other program you use. I would also love to see your color palettes!
-Kristen
More color palette inspiration: