Stonewood Painting and Decorating

New Stonewood Painting & Decorating Website

opadmin — Tue, 07 Apr 2015 09:41:48 +0000

Welcome, and thank you for visiting the new Stonewood Painting & Decorating website! We hope you will find our new site more inviting, easier to navigate and informative! The professionals at Stonewood invite you to take a look around the site to learn more about our company, our interior and exterior painting capabilities, view our portfolio or contact us for your free consultation!

Our skilled craftsmen are ready to complete your painting project today. Whether it is big or small, interior or exterior, Stonewood Painting can do it all! Don’t put off your painting projects any longer, contact us today and let our team of master painters restore the integrity of your home.

10 Tips For Picking Paint Colors

opadmin — Tue, 07 Apr 2015 09:41:31 +0000

Why do we find one place appealing and are uneasy in another? Why are we attracted to one product over another? Color—whether architectural or in products—accounts for 60 percent of our response to an object or a place.

The “buzz” about color is usually called “color psychology.” But the effects of color are subtle and significant; physical and psychological. Color use is not something that results in a definitive equation between “color and our moods,” as is a currently popular expression. Wherever we go we respond to color, but the importance of color is often underestimated. Color use is important to us personally in our homes and in the places where we work.

Start Small

If you’re not sure where to begin with color, experiment in a powder room or bathroom, a small hall or area between rooms, or an accent wall. If you’re doing your own painting, pick an area that’s quick to do so you can see your results sooner, and be happy with it or change it. Look at the process as an adventure.

To get started, select a favorite color drawn from artwork, a rug, dishes and an accessory or furniture piece as a main color or accent.

Think About Your Mood

When selecting a color, consider the mood of a room. In a bedroom do you want the feeling to be restful and soothing or dramatic and intimate? Soft, cool colors and neutrals usually create a quieter feeling while stronger colors are for drama.

Do you want a dining area to feel sociable and stimulating or appear formal and quiet? Warmer, contrasting and somewhat brighter colors add to a sociable atmosphere; deeper blue-greens and neutrals will give a more formal ambiance.

Do you want kid’s rooms to create an active and exciting energy or an orderly and restful feeling? Be careful not to overstimulate your children with intensely bright hues. You may not know it, but some brighter colors can lead to unrest and irritability.

Pay Attention to Lighting

The reason why paint stores have light boxes for you to test paint chips:

Natural daylight shows the truest color;
Incandescent lighting brings out warm tones and yellows;
Fluorescent lighting casts a sharp blue tone.

So, a strong color might be too bright and overpowering when used on all walls or next to a large window, but it might be effective when used as an accent wall with indirect light.

Learn the Color Terms

It helps to understand the terminology used to describe color.

Hue is what we call a color. Red is the hue; blue is the hue.
The value of the hue is how light or dark it is.
Saturation refers to how dominant the hue is. As we go from red to pink, the red hue becomes less dominant.
Intensity is the brilliance of the color. The pure colors such as red are more intense than the combined colors such as yellow-green. A stronger intense color usually has a more dominant hue.

If you want a more active space, consider introducing stronger, more intense color. Even if you want a light-colored room, choose colors that are slightly more saturated than off-white or light pastel. Very light color can feel bright and stark when it appears on all surfaces in a room. However, two or more medium-light, closely related pastel colors can create a luminous effect when used in the same room.

Test Your Color Choice

Boost your confidence by testing colors on poster board or large areas of a wall. Don’t be afraid to go beyond your comfort zone: Consider strong, vivid colors or soft, deep neutrals like chocolate brown or olive green as main or accent colors. Or add drama with a stronger color on the ceiling. Tinted ceilings can dramatically change the whole look of a room.

Add Depth With Decorative Finishes

Transform flat, dull walls into interesting and personal spaces with subtle or dramatic visual texture and broken color. Burnished mineral/metal finishes and layered colored glazes add depth. Some examples of softly reflective metals are mica, copper, pewter, bronze and, of course, antiqued silver and gold.

Walk Into Another Room

Consider walls as planes of color, and see how they interact when viewing one next to the other in adjacent rooms. Approach it like a composition: You’re in one room, but you’re going to see a piece of another room through it. So as you’re choosing colors, consider how they will flow from room to room to create your picture.

Follow the Color Wheel

A small color wheel is a great reference tool for modifying and intensifying two or more colors. For example, red and green, which are complementary (opposite) colors, are most intense when used together. You may be surprised at how many combinations function beautifully together, and you may even become attracted to entirely new color palettes. The color wheel also illustrates the visual temperature of a color. Draw a line from the yellow-green mark on the color wheel all the way down to the red-violet; you’ll see that all the colors on the left are warm and the colors on the right are cool.

Play Up Monochromatic Schemes

Think one color is boring? Create bold or subtle variations within one color group with contrasting paint finishes. For example, use closely related colors, or try a single color in different finishes, for walls and trim in one space.

For an accent color, select a warmer (more toward reds) or cooler (more toward blues) color to complement your main color group. For a quieter ambiance, make sure your colors are not extremely bright. White or an off-white tint can be a striking accent when used as trim with a monochromatic color group.

Choose Different Paint Finishes

A single color used on walls and trim takes on new significance when applied in different finishes. For example, wall and trim colors can remain the same hue, but use an eggshell (matte and less reflective) finish on walls and a satin or semigloss on trim. The color will appear slightly different on each surface. It’s a good way to create a cohesive look in rooms with many windows and doors, and relatively little wall area.

To read the original article on the HGTV website, click here.

7 Reasons to Hire A Professional Painter

opadmin — Tue, 07 Apr 2015 09:41:07 +0000

When it comes to painting the interior or the exterior of your home, most home owners are better off hiring professional painters to get the job done. There are many advantages to hiring a professional to do the job for you. Many people think that painting is an easy do-it-yourself project, but anyone who has ever tried to tackle a major residential painting project can tell you – it’s not that easy.

Reason #1 – Professional Quality Results

While just about anyone can pick up a can of paint from their local home improvement store and buy a couple of brushes, there’s a lot more to interior painting ideas than meets the eye. First, the goal here isn’t just to change the color of a room or to touch up chipped and scratched up paint, the goal is to add value to your home and increase its resale value. Even if you don’t plan on selling or moving any time soon, it is always good to make sure you hire professional painters who can provide you with professional quality results. Hiring a pro for exterior or interior painting in New Bedford is the best way to go if you want your home to look its best.

Reason #2 – Years of Know-How

While you might have spent 10 whole minutes watching that DIY YouTube video on how to paint your kitchen, professional painters have years of experience and knowledge that help them to produce a high quality result. For example, professional painters don’t just come in and apply the best interior paint available and leave. They spend time checking out your home inside and out, spotting out any rot, decay or structural defects that need to be repaired before painting. Professional painters can provide you with the proper materials that will help to protect your home against water vapor leaks, which can lead to rot and structural damage. Companies like Fisher & Rocha, Inc. that do home repairs, remodeling, renovations and painting, can make any necessary repairs to ensure that the job is done right the first time.

Reason #3 – New Interior Painting Ideas

Professional painters are up on all the latest technologies in the world of exterior and interior paint – yes, technology has come to the world of commercial and residential paint. They can get you set up with the best interior paint for your home’s design and location, as well as your unique needs for each room of the house. Professional painters take you beyond just “picking out colors” and help you to choose the best interior painting ideas available to create the look, feel and function that you desire.

Reason #4 – Reduced Stress

When you hire a professional to take care of your exterior or interior painting in New Bedford, you can rest-assured that the job will get done on a schedule that meets your needs. Hiring a painting company that is licensed, insured and trained goes a long way toward guaranteeing professional results. Fisher & Rocha, Inc. is your best bet for exterior or interior painting in New Bedford, with years of experience working for commercial and residential clients throughout the New England area.

Reason #5 – The Right Tools for the Right Job

Not only will professional painters do a top quality job on your home or office, but they also have all of the right tools to get the job done. If you were to do this work yourself, even if you took classes or spent a lot of time reading about tips and interior painting ideas, you would have to invest in a lot more than just a bucket of paint and a couple of brushes or rollers. Ladders, drop cloths, paint buckets, painter’s tape and many other essential accessories are required in order to get professional results.

Reason #6 – Expedited Results

It can take the average homeowner weeks, if not months, to paint the inside or outside of their home. When you hire professional painters to do the job for you, you can tell them when you want them to start and set a deadline for when you want the work finished. Delays might come if major repairs are required first, or if you are having any other home improvement work done, but most professional painters will give you a finish date so your home can get back to normal.

Reason #7 – Pros Are Insured

One of the best reasons to hire professional painters to do exterior or interior paint in New Bedford is that they are licensed and insured. Insured painters means that if anything goes wrong with the paint job, the contractors are insured and can make things right. Now that’s peace of mind that you won’t be able to get if you do the job yourself. In most cases home owners end up hiring professional painters anyway to the fix mistakes that they made after a DIY project gone wrong

To read the original article, click here.

Novato, CA

opadmin — Wed, 26 Nov 2014 15:32:58 +0000

I recently had the interior of my house painted and much of the wood restored. Oliver was professional on all levels from returning phone calls to doing an estimate to completing the work.

The attention to detail and quality of the work done is exceptional. The commitment to quality is clear in every part of the work from the estimate, to the paint used, to the cleanliness of the job site, to the environmental considerations, to the follow through with each and every aspect of the job.

I am thrilled with the outcome and look forward to using Stonewood’s services again when it is time to paint the outside!

– JM

San Francisco, CA

opadmin — Tue, 25 Nov 2014 16:25:09 +0000

Oliver mixes an easygoing nature with a perfectionist’s eye and work ethic – no mean feat. Oliver is punctual and it is satisfying to see him arrive always with the same dedicated, loyal guys.

Especially useful was Oliver’s demonstrated experience in selecting and matching colors. He presented us with both modern and classic options and enabled us to move beyond amateur guesswork, arriving at a subtle yet custom color scheme.

A San Francisco realtor told me Oliver is the best she’s ever seen.

– Christopher Schmid

Occidental, CA

opadmin — Tue, 25 Nov 2014 16:24:43 +0000

Oliver – Stonewood Painting – first painted for us in 1997. Big success. Every year since, Oliver has taken on the big jobs, like the outside with lots of prep and scaffolding – to the inside jobs with the intricacies of color and detail. Always perfect. He has now painted nearly every part of our house – kitchen (twice), living room, bedrooms, baths, etc. Always with great joy for us.

Oliver is a professional painter…but so much more. He has an exceptional eye for color. He has good listening skills and translates that to color choices. When I’ve paid attention to Oliver, I’ve been right in my selection—inside and out–due to his help.

Oliver is a perfectionist at preparation. Every detail is patched, caulked and prepped with the right stuff.

With Oliver there are no surprises. With 15 years of working with Oliver we’ve never had any surprises. That means budgets, timing, arrivals or clean-up.

If you want a great job; Oliver’s done it for us.

– Patricia Wilson-Juckett

Santa Rosa, CA

opadmin — Tue, 25 Nov 2014 16:24:16 +0000

Stonewood Painters are the best. The preparation is meticulous, the painting is without dribbles, splatters or any residue. Oliver has painted for me for well over ten years and I wouldn’t think of having any painter and crew but his.

– Kathleen Roth