Photography by Matthew Williams for Remodelista.
It’s easy to detect warm whites and chilly whites, but interior designer Michaela Scherrer sees an entire rainbow in between. This chromatic sensitivity led her to not only dress in shades of white but live entirely in a world of pales.
Michaela, shown here in her Pasadena, California, office, uses a paint tray to do her concocting.
She begins with a base paint—she has dozens and dozens of cans of white, including Benjamin Moore Regal’s pastel base, Decorator’s White, and Paper White, and the white base from Fine Paints of Europe.
Michaela’s mixing tools include plastic containers, white artist’s board for keeping careful track of each shade and formula, and universal tints—a set of Tints-All Universal Tinting Colorants is a good starter kit.
A David Weeks One-Arm Sconce with pearlized shade fits the mix in Michaela’s Guest Room.
To make sure her whites look good in the space they re intended for she always mixes her paints on site and tests them on the wall or on a painted masonite board at...
...different times of day and night but never on a rainy day you can t see the proper color For one of her clients Michaela tried out 60 hand mixed whites throughout the project
Michaela’s sunny home office is a complex warm white.
She explains that of late it s become much harder to achieve the shades she s after because of ingredients restrictions We used to have chromium in paint and we had a...
...chromium tint a gray green It would muddy things to perfection Here in California chromium is no longer allowed so I don t have that gray green underlying tone that I love
Flowers supply the only hints of bright that Michaela allows into her home.
Even the pens and pencils in her leather desk tray hewn to the palette.