Cottage Reveal — Lesley W Graham

The long awaited exterior for the cottage is almost complete!! Sam has been working on this small house on our property since August but we’ve been renovating it for THREE years. He redid all of the railings, firmed up the posts, added hand rails and just made it look so much more sophisticated and finished.

*Snipped some fall hydrangeas, stripped the leaves, and put them in containers to dry!*

We labored over the paint colors. We wanted to house to feel collective with the rest of the property while also feeling special. I really wanted it to feel like a camp cabin in the summer and a Christmas cottage in winter. We toyed around with dark like navy or black, keeping the yellow we discovered on the original clapboard (see below!), doing a dusty blue or a green. Originally I thought maybe a green we had used at our house but it just felt too bold or too bright and cheery - which wasn’t the goal.

*We switched out the original porch lamp with* *this one*.

After seeing a pin on pinterest we went with Muddled Basil by Sherwin Williams. Once we got the sample we were not sure it was going to work. It looked pretty gross next to the yellow. I just couldn’t get a vision for it. After sharing the inspiration photo with a few friends that were adamant we went for it! Friends are great in a crisis! Ha!

The cement floor and porch ceiling were both painted in a complimentary color, Honed Soapstone by Sherwin Williams, that we later added to the vinyl windows as well after priming them. Made them quiet down so much against the dark green!

*Sam touching up the vinyl windows and painting them Honed Soapstone*

For the door we toyed around with keeping the original blue (which did look very pretty!) but I wanted something more punchy and festive. I have always loved red front doors but wanted more orange than just traditional red, Red Tomato by Sherwin Williams did the trick!

We had the roof painted in Urbane Bronze by Sherwin Williams with special paint by Sherwin Williams that is designed for metal. They pressure washed and then applied two coats. We went to the professionals so no advice here on DIY!

Here are the evolution photos below: