Color in Interior Design: The Stories We Paint Into Our Lives

I can’t help but laugh when I think about some of the ways I’ve come across some interior design color schemes.

I recall a client handing me a faded ticket stub from a 1973 Zilker Park concert – burnt orange with cream lettering.

“This is the color I wake up to every morning,” she told me.

Trend reports and Pantone predictions are everywhere – but it’s the colors that feel personal to us that truly resonate. 

And as so many of our projects show, we’re big fans of color here at J. Fisher Interiors.

Whether rooted in memory or nostalgia – or simply the shades that make us feel safe, cozy, or light and free – those are the ones we’re most often drawn to.

 

The Language of Color

Color announces itself the moment someone crosses your threshold – and communicates what matters to you.

In our Austin studio, we’ve learned that color in interior design functions as a kind of emotional architecture – invisible walls and windows that shape how we move through our days.

And color is deeply personal, almost mysteriously so.

When we talk about color in interior design, we’re really discussing wavelengths of light hitting photoreceptors in our eyes, triggering cascades of neurological responses.

Research from the Journal of Vision shows that warm colors can increase heart rate, while cool colors activate the parasympathetic nervous system.

Yet science only tells part of the story.

Last month, we worked with a surgeon who wanted her home office painted the exact green of surgical scrubs. 

Not because it was calming but because that color made her feel capable, prepared, ready.

Color carries our histories, our aspirations, our unspoken needs in objective and highly personalised ways.

 

Beyond the Color Wheel

Traditional color theory teaches us about complementary schemes, analogous palettes, triadic harmonies.

These rules matter, certainly. 

But at J. Fisher Interiors, I’m not alone in believing that the most powerful use of color in interior design often breaks these conventions entirely.

Consider the Farnsworth House, Mies van der Rohe’s transparent masterpiece – colorless except for the greens and browns of nature pressing against its glass walls.

Or think about Mexican architect Luis Barragán’s homes, where shocking pink walls meet cobalt blue pools under amber light.

These spaces work because they understand something deeper about how color affects human emotion – and wield that understanding powerfully.

 

The Courage of Color

Choosing bold color in interior design requires a particular kind of bravery.

We live in an age of resale anxiety, where Zillow’s research dictates that homes with white kitchens sell for $1,500 more than those with yellow ones.

But what about living? What about the daily joy of seeing sunflower walls while making morning coffee?

A client recently asked us to design her dining room in a way that’s quite similar to what we’ve done with dining rooms before – but around a specific shade of terracotta.

In particular, it was the color of her mother’s bedroom walls when she was growing up in Italy.

It was a very precise request – and some friends and another interior designer had suggested to her that it may be too bold.

Now, that room glows like an ember at dinner parties, drawing people in, making them linger over wine and conversation.

The Environmental Psychology Journal published findings showing that personally meaningful colors in homes increase reported happiness by 23%.

It’s easy to see why.

 

Color as Memory Keeper

In our practice, we’ve noticed how color in interior design becomes a repository for experience.

The dusty blue of a childhood bedroom. The butterscotch yellow of grandmother’s kitchen. The deep burgundy of a favorite hotel in Paris.

Neuroscience research reveals that color memories are processed in the hippocampus alongside emotional memories, explaining why certain hues can transport us instantly through time.

We recently completed a primary bedroom using Benjamin Moore’s Hale Navy – not because it was trending, but because our client had honeymooned in Santorini and wanted to wake up to that specific shade of Aegean blue every morning.

 

The Subtlety of Neutrals

Not all color in interior design announces itself boldly.

Sometimes the most sophisticated palettes whisper rather than shout.

We’ve been exploring what we call “living neutrals” – colors that appear beige or grey at first glance but reveal unexpected depths. 

A greige with violet undertones. A tan that leans toward rose in afternoon light.

Sherwin-Williams’ team notes that complex neutrals engage the eye longer than simple ones, creating visual interest without overwhelming.

These subtle colors in interior design create space for living, for changing moods, for the objects and people that move through our rooms.

 

Light: The Silent Partner

There is no color without light – and this is something worth keeping in mind for interior design purposes.

The same Farrow & Ball Setting Plaster that looks peachy-pink in south-facing morning light can appear almost mauve by evening in a north-facing room.

That’s why we try to evaluate color at multiple times of day, in different weather conditions.

The Illuminating Engineering Society recommends testing paint colors under both 2700K and 3000K light temperatures to understand their full range.

But beyond technicalities, there’s poetry in how color shifts through the day – walls that blush at sunrise, deepen at noon, go mysterious by candlelight.

 

The Psychology of Saturation

Intensity matters as much as hue when considering color in interior design.

A barely-there blush pink creates entirely different psychological effects than a fully saturated fuchsia, even though they share the same base hue.

Take a look at our Westlake Her Place bedroom, for instance, where we made the bold choice to incorporate soft pink walls, balanced out by greenery beyond the wide windows:

Not too bright or overpowering – but a statement, no doubt.

We recently designed a home office using gradually increasing saturation of blue – palest powder on the ceiling, deepening to navy on an accent wall.

The effect creates a sense of grounding without heaviness, focus without rigidity.

 

Biophilic Color Connections

Something I’m especially interested in is how the colors we’re drawn to often echo the natural world – even when we don’t consciously realize it.

Vision research has found that humans appear to have innate preferences for colors found in healthy natural environments – the blue of clear sky, the green of thriving plants, the brown of fertile earth.

This explains why certain palettes feel inherently “right” in interior spaces.

We’ve been incorporating what we call “landscape palettes” into our recent projects – color in interior design that mirrors the Texas Hill Country outside our windows.

Sage greens, limestone whites, sunset corals, live oak browns. 

These colors both look beautiful and feel like home.

 

The Unexpected Power of Black

Black in interior design deserves special mention, in my view.

Often dismissed as too dramatic or light-absorbing, black actually serves as a powerful tool for defining space and creating intimacy.

And personally, I’m a big fan of the way a black wall can make colors appear so vibrant by contrast.

We painted a powder room in Benjamin Moore’s Black Beauty last year.

Against those dark walls, brass fixtures glow like jewelry, and guests’ faces are softly flattered by the reflected warmth.

 

The Seasonal Shift

Color in interior design doesn’t have to be permanent.

We encourage clients to think seasonally about certain spaces – slipcovers that change with the calendar, throws and pillows that rotate with the light.

A living room that wears white linen in summer can transform with burgundy velvet come October.

This flexibility allows color to respond to our changing moods, to the way we inhabit spaces differently as the year turns.

 

Finding Your Palette

Discovering your authentic color palette requires patience and attention.

We ask clients to collect images, certainly, but also to notice what they’re wearing when they feel most themselves.

To pay attention to the colors that make them pause in galleries, in nature, in shops.

One exercise we love: photograph the contents of your closet, your bookshelf, your pantry.

Patterns emerge, and your true colors reveal themselves in what you choose when you’re not thinking about choosing.

 

The Investment in Color

Quality color in interior design requires quality paint – a truth that has only grown more and more evident to me over time.

Premium paints can contain up to 40% more pigment than standard paints.

The depth of color, the way light plays across the surface, the longevity of the finish – these details matter enormously in how a space feels.

 

Breaking the Rules

The most memorable interiors often ignore conventional color wisdom entirely.

We designed a bedroom similar in size and shape to the one from our Redbud Trail project last year entirely in shades of purple – from palest lavender to deepest eggplant.

Traditional theory would call this monotonous. 

Instead, it feels like being inside an amethyst, crystalline and surprising.

Color in interior design should serve life, not rules.

 

Living With Intention

Ultimately, color in interior design is a precise, intentional choice.

It’s a way to surround yourself with hues that support who you are and who you’re becoming at the same time.

And the colors we live with shape our days in subtle but profound ways, so that’s important to think about too.

Here at J. Fisher Interiors, we take the view that every color choice is an opportunity to articulate something essential about how you want to live.

Ready to discover what color in interior design could mean for your space? 

We’d love to explore your palette – the colors that resonate with your story, your dreams, your way of moving through the world. 

Let’s have a conversation about bringing your authentic colors home.