My New Green House

Did I get you with that blog post title? I don't actually have a new greenhouse. But I do have a newly green HOUSE.

I had my house painted last week. It was light gray for almost ten years, since we bought it. Now it's dark green, with off-white trim and plum accents on the shingles on the three gables at the top. It's hard to see in the picture below, but it had faded unevenly in spots, and a lot of the white trim had flaked and peeled.

Before -- light gray with slate blue shingles and white trim

After -- dark green with plum shingles and off-white trim

More specifically, the colors are Sherwin Williams "Hunt Club," "Blackberry," and "Westhighland White." We tested a couple of different combinations of colors on the siding, including a green called "Shamrock" that was really green and another called "Burgundy" that had a touch of magenta in it when the afternoon sun hit it.

In preparation, I had to move all the potted plants off the front steps, and all the furniture and pots off the back porch and back steps, and all the pots in the pot ghetto away from the side of the house. Now that it's done I have to sort through them all over again and put them back.

Here's the back

My sage green garden shed

Several years ago I had my garden shed painted, and I chose a sage green color that I thought I would use for the house when the time came. But Nigel vetoed it as insipid, and in retrospect I'm glad he did, I'm really happy with the dark green.

We used a group called CertaPro, and we were happy with the job they did. It's always stressful having workmen running around, either inside or outside the house, and painters are notoriously hard on foundation plants. I cut back some of the plantings that were touching the house, and they still ended up breaking a few branches on my oakleaf Hydrangea. But considering many people cut those back hard every spring and they bounce back, I'm not worried. Plus, it's right next to an enormous Mahonia 'Charity' which probably got revenge on any damage done to its neighbor.

I was really tired that first day they were here, and fell asleep on the couch, only to wake up to find all the windows had been covered in plastic. I felt like a bug that had been encased in a building about to be fumigated.

Plastic covered all the windows

It only took them a little over two days. They came late on the first afternoon, around 4:30, to power wash the house, and then came for the next two full days and painted.

The house matches my greenhouse now, which is made of green wrought iron. It's only been a few days and I'm still startled every time I back the car out of the garage.