Go for gold in your home decor by using pops of yellow
Yellow has always been a provocative colour. In Qing Dynasty China, yellow was reserved for the Imperial family alone. Nobody else was allowed wear it. In 19th-century France, sexy fiction came wrapped in yellow paper. The colour was both a warning and an invitation. The Yellow Book, a literary periodical (1894-1897) took its name from these risqué novels. Oscar Wilde famously complained that the publication “was not yellow at all”. When he was arrested in April 1895, the Winchester Gazette reported: “Arrest of Oscar Wilde, Yellow Book Under his Arm.” This was probably the relatively respectable literary journal, but the newspapers treated it as though he was carrying porn.
In interiors, yellow is on the frisky side of the colour wheel. It’s never going to be the most popular colour on the paint chart but a pop of yellow goes a long way to enlivening a room. “Personally, I love yellow,” says Siobhan Lam of April and the Bear. “It screams energy and fun.”
In her own home, she decided to paint the entire hallway in a strong bright yellow (Circle Line yellow from Myland’s of London). “We painted everything yellow — the floor, the walls, the ceiling — we submerged it all! And it’s so fun. It’s a small enough space so it’s not too much, but it really looks great and guests love it!” The hallway is a good place to experiment with strong colour because nobody stays there for long.
While there’s great pleasure in seeing someone else do something truly nutty with yellow paint, most of us prefer yellow in small doses. “It’s a highlight hue,” Lam says “Yellow makes a statement. People are drawn towards it when they want a shade that is going to stand out next to more neutral colours or a darker space.” This element of surprise is often incorporated into the design of an object. “More often than not, a yellow piece of furniture or home accessory is going to be a fun, bold piece. Why else is it yellow?”
A vase in the shape of a banana (€40) is not meant to be taken seriously, especially with flowers sticking out of each end. Neither is a cushion printed with a large yellow cat (€80) nor an art print showing the words: “Wait, let me overthink this” (from €35). “That print sells out constantly and I think the vibrant yellow backdrop has something to do with it,” Lam says. “We design a lot of our prints in-house and we’ve noticed that when we create yellow prints, they really seem to hit a chord.”
It’s easy to overthink yellow. It looks fabulous in photographs but too much is hard on the eyes. “Go small to start with,” Lam recommends. “Introduce a yellow cushion or an art print with yellow on it. Let it sit in your space for a few weeks. If you still love it, go bigger!” Yellow works particularly well in mid-century style furniture. “We have several mustard pieces in store from mid-century brand 366 Concept and the colour really complements the shape of the furniture. It all just works so well together.”
Mustard yellow has been around for a while but, as far as Lam is concerned, it’s not going anywhere. “Mustard is a timeless but punchy shade that works well with so many other colours. Having said that, brighter more citrusy yellow is definitely having a moment.” In fashion and interiors, the summer’s trending colour is butter yellow. This is a pastel hue — pretty much what you’d find inside a packet of Kerrygold — and The Glossary Magazine has described it as: “landing on the spectrum between canary yellow and beige.”
“I’d call butter yellow a beige,” says Niamh Courtney, colour consultant. “People are wanting to go back to neutrals, they’re wanting to go back to beige, but they’re afraid to admit it.” Beige is frequently accused of blandness, but it really doesn’t deserve the bad rap. “Anything in the beige family is warm, easy to live with and can be used on the walls throughout the whole house.”
“People go for yellow because they want brightness,” Courtney says. “They think it will bring the sunshine in. But intense and vibrant yellows are hard to live with — they’re great for a chest of drawers or a sofa — but not on the walls. When it comes to paint, what people are really looking for is closer to a nursery yellow or a cream.”
Pale neutral yellows that work well in Irish homes include Bakewell from Acres Hall; Provence Cream from Fleetwood; and Salon Yellow Walls from Kraftsman Paints, which was used for generations on the walls of Russborough House. “At the end of the day all the paint brands have the same thing going on but they’re laying it out differently and marketing it differently.”
If you’ve set your heart on full-on yellow walls, Courtney recommends looking at historic paint collections. “You won’t see vibrancy, they’ll be muted golds and they’re easier to live with because they’re coming from the original pigments — the ochres and natural clays.” Think saffron and turmeric, rather than lemon zest.
Her favourites include Brushed Gold from Dulux and India Yellow from Farrow & Ball, which is named for a historic pigment created from the urine of cows fed on mango leaves. On this diet they produced luminous yellow pee, which was collected in pots, boiled down, strained, and roasted by the fire. Lovely.
One of the good things about yellow is that it goes with almost any other colour. “If I had a buttercup yellow sofa, I’d combine it with an off-white wall rather than a cream. It’s a modern look and it would give a crisp clear quality to the room,” Courtney says.
Alternatively, if you’re going for a moody den, consider placing the yellow sofa against a wall painted in rust, navy, plum or charcoal grey. “When I suggest grey, people throw up their hands and say they’re so over it,” Courtney says. They need to get over themselves. There are many shades of grey.
If there’s autism in the family, be aware that some autistic people have a negative reaction to yellow. I’m married to one of them. He’s deeply averse to monochrome blocks of yellow. Daffodils aren’t a problem because of the subtle variation within the tone of each flower.
“It’s very important to me that the colour yellow is variegated,” he says. “Yellow represents enthusiasm and if an emotion is uniform, it’s fake. A solid block of yellow represents fake enthusiasm. It gives me a headache and makes me nauseous.” For an autistic person, the headaches and nausea aren’t a metaphor. They’re real.
See aprilandthebear.com and choosingcolour.ie
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