I see a red door...

[Rogar]

...and I want to paint it black? I've been doing some slow morning bike tours of my area of 50's and 60's homes. Maybe I've not paid close enough attention, but the trend for blacks and greys has become hard to ignore. I think about half of the old brick homes have been painted black or grey, with doors and garage doors that match or with a light natural wood. Similar for the siding of frame homes. And black window frames. The nice pastels of my neighbors houses have been gradually replaced with some shade of grey. It all seems a little ominous and lacking of color and variety. Perhaps a bit of a personal rant, but a trend I've not noticed that seems odd. I suppose at some point those mid-century homes need a face lift to be current.

[catherine]

My daughter's MIL and I were talking about that the other day, and she sent me pictures of houses that had been painted dark colors:

https://www.hgtv.com/outdoors/landscaping-and-hardscaping/hgtv-stars-share-the-coolest-black-houses-pictures

I don't get it either.. I can see it for a particular style of modern house, but not for many other styles of homes. The little Cape Cod in the article that's half black and half natural cedar shingles is just ugly.

The first picture in the article looks a little like a mid-century modern re-do.

[JaneV2.0]

The circa 1911 house I grew up in was painted charcoal gray. My favorite paint jobs ever were shades of purple. I kind of like black doors.

[bae]

When I repainted mine a few years ago, our HOA was considering implementing a "natural tones only" restriction(*). So, I repainted my house using several different shades of purple, tones selected by walking around the neighborhood and observing the purple colors of some of the native plants. It looks so much nicer than the dull multiple-grey scheme it had previously.

(*) It was pointed out to our new residents from CA that, well, this HOA only has the power to maintain the road and water system here, and they had no authority to impose anything at all. They seemed grumpy about that.

[ApatheticNoMore]

I believe a red door is good luck in Feng Shui (which I don't subscribe to, but one reason one might see them). I've read it can symbolize a house is paid off. Of course a red door might be just a red door because they liked the color.

[frugal-one]

I've also noticed many houses in my area are also painted very dark colors. BTW My house is white with 2 red doors.... has been for years. And, I love it! Many have commented on it as well. Didn't know it had any connotation??

[KayLR]

Yes, entire developments here have the look of dull greyish-brown-tan boredom. It is depressing. Bad enough that we are being overdeveloped in the first place. And homes which aren't in the developments are following trend.

Further, for some time I have noticed the lack of automobile color range too. When we bought our last one, I told DH, NO gray, silver, white, tan, or black. It was HARD to find one! And in the winter, when it's so awful gray, drizzly and pouring rain, it's not easy sometimes to see the other cars in traffic. They all match the gray skies and the gray pavement and the passing gray buildings. Ugh.

[pinkytoe]

I noticed a house in our hood that was recently painted black. I thought at first it was in a fire as it looked so odd. Speaking of car colors, DH showed me a slide of his Dad's first family car - a 1956 two-toned Ford Fairlane - coral and black. I wonder why they no longer do two tone cars :)

[Tybee]

You see some of those dark grey capes here; we call them House of Usher houses because they give us the creeps.

[JaneV2.0]

I noticed a house in our hood that was recently painted black. I thought at first it was in a fire as it looked so odd. Speaking of car colors, DH showed me a slide of his Dad's first family car - a 1956 two-toned Ford Fairlane - coral and black. I wonder why they no longer do two tone cars :)

I still love two-tone cars--probably why I find Fiats so appealing.

[ToomuchStuff]

Red door is a Feng Shui, wanting to paint it black, is a Rolling Stones song, LOL. Black doors and window frames are pretty traditional to me at least. I have always liked black frames (kind of fade into the windows, then surround with a pop of color in trim or shutters, etc).
Grey on houses can be great. There is a house I think is gorgeous I drive by on the way to the credit union. Grey, white trim, green grey shutters. Black houses, not so much. Seen a 1920's bungalow that was painted black, and several others, pink. 1950's weren't good for these, IMHO.

[jp1]

I had not noticed the house color thing before but will now likely notice it everywhere. Cars, on the other hand, having been driving me crazy with their drabness for years. SO knows that when I finally replace my inherited drab silver Honda it will be with something bright and cheerful. Fire engine red with matching interior would be my first choice.

I wonder what the reason is behind all the drab conformity. Is it just that people have no imagination and houses and cars are expensive, so they go with "safe" colors that won't hurt resale? Or is there some deeper issue, a collective societal depression that has left people with dour outlooks which renders them not interested in anything bright and cheerful? Or something else?

[ApatheticNoMore]

Most cars may as well be black and white movies, black, white and grey. Henry Ford was ultimately mostly right about what people want, any color you want as long as it's black OR .... white or gray. White seems most common then gray.

I like white, the reasoning is pretty simply, it reflects heat (might silver do the same as those foil covering things you put on car windows do? And those foil coverings do work btw. I do not know). The point is to keep the car as cool as possible (and yes tan or light gray cloth interiors and the like are good, black leather or maybe it's more often pleather interiors - woah they can burn the flesh). I mean we get more hot weather than cold weather, more with climate change. So it's heat not cold that needs mitigating, so the car is slightly less an oven when you get into it on a hot day.

[early morning]

Someone in a neighboring town bought a lovely old church (from a congregation that built a new monstrosity outside of town), and promptly painted it black. I am not a fan of black houses in general, but the black church looks cool. The new owners turned the old sanctuary into an indoor playroom for their kids, complete with a slide from the choir loft. Sounds like a good re-use to me!

https://nypost.com/2022/02/24/inside-the-church-an-ohio-family-made-its-home/

(please don't tag me as a NYPost reader - I googled the church and found the article, lol)

[pinkytoe]

The new subdivision houses here are all the same drab shade of dirt on which they sit.

[catherine]

My neighborhood is more Edward Scissorhands in a way. the houses on one side are all blah beige, but on my side each one is a different pastel.

When I painted our house exterior I considered the neighborhood and thus added another light color (sage green) to the mix of white yellow, blue, red. It fits the summer cabin vibe.

[iris lilies]

The new subdivision houses here are all the same drab shade of dirt on which they sit.
Isn’t that awful? Yes, new houses of the past dozen + years here are light beige, dark beige, putty, light tan, and greyge.. Mainly like the cars although there were occasional red and dark blue cars.

At least in cars I’ve been seeing the past couple years real colors like baby blue, Kia lime green, Jeep yellow and Jeep orange, etc. Maybe we will start to see some color in houses again.

[rosarugosa]

Around here there seems to be an unwritten law that all new or newly sided houses must be grey with white trim, or dark greyish/navy with white trim or greige with white trim. Don't get me wrong; I like grey, but it's become so ubiquitous (as I sit here in my grey pants and grey shirt at my grey desk, lol).

[rosarugosa]

When I bought my Focus in 2014, they had a green that I liked, but it cost $1000 more than the black. I am not enough of a car person to care about my car's color all that much, so I went with the black and figured I could always buy a green sweater or something for a whole lot less than a thousand bucks.

[lmerullo]

house is sage green with forest trim and a garnet front door. The front door was second hand and I never repainted. I'd like to do the door and trim in a muted pumpkin / terra cotta, but hubby resists.

No worries of being too bright - the neighbor has a very pale gray home with bright teal trim and the other is tan home with purple trim. There's also bright red trim on our street. One home (gray with white trim currently) is a rental and the owner repaints every other year, frequently changing colors.

[jp1]

Since we live in a townhouse the hoa painted them all at once. Decisions had been made about color before we purchased and then they painted a few months after we moved in. Each building is 2-4 units and they alternated the color between greenidh grey and a slightly lighter greenish grey….