Decorating Your Home With Orange & Peach

Bright orange is a high-energy color, full of sizzle and excitement. It brings warmth and comfort to a room, and is frequently used in restaurants due to its stimulating effect on the appetite. If you love orange, you are probably a nurturing, enthusiastic and bubbly person who loves to be around others.

Orange fell from its height of favor in the 1970s as a decorating staple, but has recently been staging a comeback, especially in darker tones or softened with a bit of gold. It is a versatile color for decorating; useful for adding small punches of dramatic color, creating a natural look, or playing a supporting role in your room, all depending on what shade of orange you choose.

Setting the Mood

All colors have various shades and orange is no exception. Depending on the orange you use in your home, you can create different moods with colors.

Decorating With Bright Orange

Too much bright orange on its own is reminiscent of a fast-food burger joint, but small touches are very effective at bringing a cheerful, slightly retro look to a room. If you want to make a splash with bright orange, use it in a room with other warm brights such as yellow and red. Keep the color scheme from becoming overwhelming by using the brights as accents, with the main colors neutrals of white, cream, tan or brown. Sage green is another soft neutral that will tone down bright orange. Either choose one single, large feature like a wall to paint bright orange, with the remainder of the room decorated in neutrals, or use several small items like pillows, lamps or paintings in bright orange, with larger items in neutral colors. The key is to strike a balance.

If you want to create the ultimate in intense, exciting color schemes, design your room around a mixture of bright orange and turquoise. For the boldest look of all, paint a focal-point wall bright orange, choose a medium brown or tan carpet, dark brown furniture, and plenty of orange and turquoise accents throughout the room.

Decorating With Deep Orange

Deep oranges with a hint of brown or red are earthy and more soothing than bright orange. A warm, friendly color, deep orange is a good choice for a living room, dining area or family gathering area. Deeper shades of orange are good partners with cream, brown and sage green. For an interesting contrast, combine dark orange with a medium shade of smoky blue. If you are looking for high contrast, spark up dark orange with purple for a pleasing, rich combination. Achieve a classic, formal look (or autumn décor) with dark orange, white and black. For a true orange lover, walls painted in a deep orange make a dramatic statement, but need to be toned down with white or cream trim and neutral furnishings and accents.

Decorating With Terracotta

This shade of earthy, burnt orange is the basis for Mediterranean or Tuscan décor, and gives a warm, welcoming appearance to your home. Like other shades of orange, terracotta is a good choice for the dining, living or family rooms. Combine terracotta with gold, olive green, burnt red and browns for a touch of the Tuscan countryside. Small touches of ocean blue are often used with the Mediterranean style to provide a cool counterpoint to all the warmth. Terracotta is an excellent choice for a dramatic wall, especially if textured with a glaze of gold, paler orange or tan. It’s also the classic for tile floors in the Mediterranean style.

Decorating With Peach

Soft and gentle, peach goes well with any other color, and makes the perfect backdrop for almost any decorating style. This is the one shade of orange suitable for use in the bedroom, as it is less stimulating than the brighter or darker oranges. Peach goes well with other soft or medium shades of blue, green or tan. Avoid an entire color scheme of lights or pastels, however, which could create a wishy-washy, uninteresting room. Peach can be livened up with touches of bright orange, robin’s egg blue and grass green, or used as the backdrop for a room with high-intensity brights. Walls are soft and feminine in peach paint, and it’s a good color for carpets. White trim will keep it from looking too plain.

Orange In Furniture & Accessories

Your furniture choices in an orange room will depend on your décor style, as well as the shade of orange predominating in the room. In general, furniture in brown leather or medium to dark wood will look the most current. If you are looking to add orange furniture, make sure the walls and accessories are neutral shades.

If you are using accessories to add orange to your room, look for some of the following in your chosen shade:

• Area rugs
• Throw pillows
• Picture frames
• Curtains
• Lamps
• Footrests
• Small tables
• Baskets
• Collectibles

More Tips For Decorating With Orange

• Unless you are deliberately trying to create a retro style, keep a room based on bright orange contemporary and fresh. Furniture with glass tops or shelves, or glass cabinets will help provide an interesting distraction from the brightness of the color. A couch or large piece covered in bright orange might be too much, but an armchair, curtains, an area rug or small table in bright orange will look cheerful and friendly.
• Dark orange is best with dark woods to balance the color. A dark orange couch can look very dramatic in a room with wood and dark colors, but be sure to balance it with cream, white, tan or pale gray to keep the look from becoming dark and claustrophobic. If you want to stay with smaller touches of orange, look for a rug or chair in a dark orange shade.
• Terracotta complements medium and dark wood tones, as well as leather and furniture with burnished metal accents. Ornate touches of wrought iron and heavy pottery will further the Mediterranean feel of a room based on terracotta and other earth tones.
• Peach is soft enough to work with a wider range of furniture. Suitable for use with darker woods, it also looks nice with lighter tones, or even with natural or white wicker. If you use light furniture in a peach room, be sure to have some darker accents for contrast and to keep the room from looking blah.

Cheerful, warm and friendly, orange and its various shades are a good way to decorate a home with a welcoming, lively style. Whether you use orange as your main decorating color or as an accent, it’s sure to bring an exciting feel to your décor.