COLOURFUL LANGUAGE
Paint colour ‘should speak to your personality,’ suggests HGTV’s Sarah Baeumler
Sarah Baeumler makes no bones about it: she’s not a professional designer. But having tackled three major renovations — two Torontoarea homes and a cottage on Georgian Bay — with husband, HGTV star Bryan Baeumler, the mother of four knows her way around a paint can.
“(Paint colour) should speak to your personality,” says the petite blond during a recent visit to Ottawa to flog a new paint line, HGTV HOME by Sherwin-Williams, available exclusively at Lowe’s. The Baeumlers are the ambassadors for the new collection.
She admits that standing in front of a wall of tiny paint chips trying to choose the right colour for your walls, woodwork and furniture can be daunting, but she insists it doesn’t have to be.
“Painting is an easy weekend project. It shouldn’t be scary or overwhelming,” says Baeumler, who credits the 16 colour collections in the new paint line for taking the guesswork out of narrowing down myriad options.
Each palette includes 20 colours that all work well together, to help homeowners “design with confidence.”
After more than two years, the Baeumlers recently completed their “forever home” on a 20acre rural property close to the picturesque Niagara Escarpment. Season 4 of House of Bryan: The Final Straw, on HGTV, will follow the couple and their crew as they put the finishing touches on the mammoth sixbedroom home, which is teeming with expensive marble, glittery chandeliers and opulent furnishings. The first of eight episodes aired Oct. 11.
“I liken it to having a baby,” says Baeumler of living through a renovation with four children under age 10 amid the construction chaos and mess. “After it’s over, you forget about all the pain, and now it’s just bliss.”
When it came to choosing paint for the open-concept layout, she confesses: “I was a little lost.”
Her biggest challenge was picking a colour scheme that would tie the rooms together. “I wanted it to flow room by room. I didn’t want them to be disjointed boxes.”
Convincing her husband, a fellow Type-A personality, to trust her sometimes offbeat choices, including soft pink in the upstairs sitting room and dark grey in the boys’ “manly” bathroom, was often a struggle, too.
Can’t really blame the guy. Not many of us would install black cabinetry, marble floors and a chandelier in a room where we wash our dirty clothes.
“Sometimes people don’t pay attention to the rooms where they spend the most time,” says Baeumler, who opted for a chic New York boutique style for her windowless laundry room. “I made it very glamorous. I put love and personality into the space.”
Reflecting her children’s personalities was also key when decorating their bedrooms.
“We tried very hard to make sure each room was distinctive of our kids’ personalities,” she says at the end of season 3’s House of Bryan: In the Sticks.
In eldest son Quintyn’s room, three walls were painted deep navy — the 10-year-old’s choice — with a feature wall of reclaimed barn board behind his bed. Faux antlers and a mounted ceramic animal head add to the outdoorsy feel.
“Quintyn is a little adventure man,” said his proud dad during a televised tour of the finished room. “He’s an outdoor guy and very in touch with nature. He wanted his room to reflect his personality. This is so him.”
In eight-year-old Charlotte’s room, an exotic metallic gold design was stencilled up one wall, and the all-white furniture was fitted with gold handles. Her mom describes the look as “a new take on a princess room.”
“The reality is it’s their home and space, too,” says Baeumler, who encourages parents to let their children be involved in decorating their bedrooms.
Her advice: Give them only three or four colour options — preferably, ones you can live with — so they don’t get overwhelmed.