The first and often broadest mistake people make when it comes to wallpaper color selection is assuming that just a color.

For every major color out there, you can break things down into smaller bins that refer to “tone.” Each major color has warm tones, cool tones and neutral tones, and these can look very different in a given room. Some tones may appear differently in certain kinds of light, such as sunlight versus man-made. This is why it’s important to try out samples in different lights and make sure they’re the look you’re truly going for.

 

Many of us want bright, colorful themes in our home color schemes, but there’s such thing as going too far with this. It’s important to consider how you’ll be matching furniture and other room elements with your wallpaper, and doing so for exceedingly bright color schemes is much harder. If you absolutely must have a bright color, at least consider a pastel shade or something a little softer as an accent.

 

Maybe the most common mistake out there is painting a small area as a “sample,” then using that as the basis for the entire wallpaper project. This isn’t the right way to test a color – you need to see a broad picture of that color and how it interacts with the rest of the room, even if this means you have to layer just a bit.

 

You may think your deep green, earthy tones look fantastic during this fall period we’re in currently, but will you feel the same by next spring or summer? Only go with a seasonal design if you’re 100 percent sure you can commit to it the full year-round.

 

Not only does wallpaper have to complement furniture in a given room, it has to complement flooring as well. Matching here can vary widely depending on whether the room in question uses tile, wood, carpet or some other flooring type. Consider how the shade you’re looking at will clash with or complement your flooring.