One of my favourite colour combinations has to be dark green and gold. I love the richness of these colours and always dreamed of having Dark Jade bridesmaids’ dresses with gold accessories for my wedding (that was until I met Mr B and we had a shotgun wedding 4 months later in a Gin Distillery with no bridesmaids and plenty of Gin, but that’s another story!)
Using Dark Green in your home
Probably the most commented and talked about wall in my house has to be my dark green wall in my living room. The Blue Jade paint by Valspar gets more comments than I’ve had hot dinners (and believe me, I eat a LOT!) and if I had been paid commission for every time I told someone what the colour was, I would have gone offline and booked a round the world cruise by now and paid Ryan Gosling to come with me (sorry Mr B! )
It such a strikingly beautiful colour and one that I would happily use in every room, if I had the budget to change all my furniture and accessories! Although, saying that, it does pretty much go with everything.
A very autumnal looking living room – this was taken in October, obviously! 🙂
The yellow living room
Let’s go back to the Living Room beginning shall we? When we moved into our house, the Living Room was a bright yellow, with green and white curtains and wooden furniture. I get why they decided on the yellow, it brought out the colour in the Sunflowers on the tile surround of the fireplace, but it was just a bit much for me.
Also, the walls were crumbling and had holes in it, so we had to get the room replastered and start again. Our builders did a superb job and when they finished replastering, they asked what colour we wanted it painted and immediately I said white.
I had literally whitewashed my whole house without a spot of colour in there and that was how I was going to keep it. I think I was a little afraid of colour at this point, until one day I saw this photo on Instagram…
My obsession with green begins
At this point in my life, I didn’t know how much I loved the colour Emerald or Jade green and suddenly I became obsessed with it. I had already found a mid-century chest of drawers in a charity shop for £25 which we were using as a TV unit and I knew they’d look perfect together.
Buying the paint, not an easy decision!
The hardest part was trying to find the right colour green for the living room and boy! I didn’t know how many green paint choices that were out there. I wanted something that was deep and rich and was a good contrast to my furniture. In the end, it took me nearly 6 months to choose the paint and I went with Blue Jade by Valspar.
I was also torn between painting an accent wall and painting the whole room. Our living room is west facing, but is always quite dark as we have tall trees and bushes in the front garden blocking out a lot of light so I decided to go with an accent wall to begin with and see how we got on with it.
Once I had finished painting the accent wall, I knew that I didn’t need to paint the whole room, but to add splashes of green and gold throughout bringing the whole room together. The first thing we had to decide on, was what rug to use on the floor. The trend at the time was the infamous monochrome “La Redoute Rug” and I purchased this in the sale which fitted in perfectly with the green wall.
Now for the furniture
Next, I needed to decide what furniture to use in the living room that went with the green wall and walnut TV unit. I was really drawn to the industrial style shelving units and coffee tables so we bought some shelves from Maisons Du Monde and the parquet style coffee table from La Redoute.
I needed to hang something above the fireplace and I’ve always liked mirrors in the living room, especially when it’s quite a dark space like this room, as it reflects more light. I found our nonagon mirror in a charity shop for £3 and spray painted it gold.
Creating a gallery wall
I think I knew when I painted the green wall that I would probably keep it as an accent wall as it was such a rich colour, but I had to decide what to do with the wall opposite. I’ve always loved gallery walls so I found different pieces of art that picked out the colours of the room, mainly green, gold and yellow and tried to not make it too over curated.
I also found a few monochrome prints as I liked how this tied the La Redoute rug into the gallery scheme. I was also lucky enough to find some cushions from Fox & Ivy at Tesco to match the green wall perfectly, tying in the soft furnishings on my old brown sofa. If you would like to create your own gallery wall, see my tips here.
And finally, the green velvet sofa arrives.
I always knew we would eventually replace the sofa as it was too brown, bulky and looked ridiculous as two separate pieces, so I was very lucky when sofa.com offered me a new sofa. Without a second thought, I ordered a green velvet sofa as this would be the icing on the dark green living room cake and was extremely happy when it turned up. It really did pull the whole room together and looked fabulous with the gallery wall.
Dark green also looks amazing against wood, be that wood flooring, furniture or doors and I couldn’t decide whether to keep the monochrome rug or the bare wooden floors (the rug won out eventually, especially in winter! I love wooden floors, but they do make a room feel cold).
The last addition, the bar cart.
One of the last additions to the room was a gold bar cart that I found in a charity shop for £15. I upcycled it with tropical wallpaper from Wilko’s and found a few gold candles and ornaments which provided a good contrast against the green wall. I then added some botanical and floral prints above the bar cart, plenty of plants and the important stuff, alcohol!
No longer did I have to leave my velvet sofa to get a top up, I could just wheel the trolley over to me and never have it more than an arm’s length away! Chin chin.
So, there you have it, a very long-winded description on how to use green in your living room! I still think painting this wall dark green is one of the best decisions I’ve made since we’ve renovated our house. “What colour and make is that green?” is probably the most asked question I get on Instagram so I thought I’d write a post on it. Hope you took some inspiration away from this post!
Update
Our living room has had many changes over the last year and now I’m finally happy with the way it looks! Rug by Dunelm.
Mel x
Your room looks beautiful! Great post.
Author
Thank you Fiona! xx
Author
Thank you Arlene! I absolutely adore this colour, it is so rich and beautiful during the day and night. I bet you will love it! 🙂
Author
Hi Allison
It’s a beautiful colour isn’t it? It’s Valspar so I’m sure they would be able to get a colour match?
Mel x
I have a very similar living room and would love to add this color! What color did you use on the other walls?
Author
Our other walls are white. I wasn’t sure I wanted the whole room to be that dark, but we have a dark green sofa and gallery wall (picture above) opposite the green wall and it ties the whole room in together nicely.
Wow. What an amazing, and brave choice. I’m renovating at the moment, and although I love the Scandi white and wood, you can’t beat colour to give it warmth/ depth and a bit of personality. Fab post.
Author
Thank you Johanna! I don’t think I could ever have my living room a different colour. This dark green is fabulously warm in the winter months and amazingly bright in the summer. I love it 🙂
Johanna, your room is just fabulous. Just wondering where the wallpaper is from and did you use it as I couldn’t see any pics with it in situ?
Author
Hi Christine
I didn’t use the wallpaper in the end as loved the green paint so much. Here’s the link https://www.annaglover.co.uk/samples/garden-of-serica-malachite
Mel x
Hi
What colour curtains do you have?
Author
Hi Judy
We don’t have any curtains, we have a bay window with white wooden blinds and the rest of the room is painted white.
Mel 🙂
I can’t seem to find this colour on the Valspar website. Where did you buy it from?
Author
Hi Sarah
I bought the paint from B&Q. If you go into your nearest B&Q and find the Valspar aisle, they will make it up for you.
Mel 🙂
It is a wonderful article stating about the how to use dark green in your living room.This article is very helpful. This article mentions and acts as such a moving trigger. It is an article worth applauding for based on its content. I have also found this resource pppainting.co.nz useful and its related to what you are mentioning.
I absolutely love this look, so much so that I’ve constantly referred back to it during the last few weeks when I’ve been revamping my living room and I’m so pleased with the final result! I know you’ve already said that you have white wooden blinds, but I just wanted to ask if you did decide to have curtains what style/colour do you think you’d go for?
Author
Hi Lynsey
I love inspiring people to use bold colours in their home and happy you’re pleased with the results! We decided not to go with curtains in the end and just kept with the white wooden blinds. I think if I was to go for curtains as well, I’d keep them floor length and white also. This is because there is a lot of other things going on in our living room, like the green wall and gallery wall, pink and green sofas! So I would want to keep all other decor plain. Hope this helps! Mel 🙂
Amazing and useful tips… Thanks for sharing this post.
Author
Thank you for commenting. Mel 🙂
Love the room!! Where did you get the black and white palm tapestry hanging behind the pink couch?
Author
Hello! I got it from https://www.roseandgrey.co.uk/extra-large-jungle-print-wall-chart Mel 🙂
Hi, first of all your room looks fantastic, l love it. I am planning on using the same colour in my lounge, at the moment the walls are papered in a natural fern print by Laura Ashley, from floor to ceiling with a white dado rail, and is still in very good Condition , despite being up for approx 8 years. My husband has never painted over wallpaper before but l suggested we leave the paper on the top half of the walls and paint the below the dado rail with Blue Jade by Valspar. Any ideas would be appreciated.
Author
Hi Carol
What colour is the fern print? I’m guessing a green? This sounds like a wonderful idea, I love paint and wallpaper mixed up together and a dado rail provides a fantastic border. Blue Jade is such a rich colour it can go with a lot of things I think!
Mel 🙂
Hi Mel,
Absolutely love your colours!! I’m looking to go over to the dark side in my lounge and love green. Would you say your colour has blue tones to it? I’ve seen two colours I absolutely adore, Angelica by Craig and Rose and Botanical Noir by Elle … stuck between the two .. any help or advice on choosing please ..
Author
Hi Jackie
I would say the dark green in my living room doesn’t really have any blue tones to it, it’s such a rich green colour that changes throughout the day and I love it. Personally, I think Botanical Noir is closer to my colour and is a much richer green, which you may find easier to pair with other colours. I also think richer greens bring out wood tones better.
Hope this helps! Mel 🙂
These are brilliant ideas! Thanks for sharing