American Pine

At this depth the yellow-green undertone is not a color choice so much as a mood: it shows at the edges, in raking light, and nowhere else. Kilz's designation for it is TB-69.

With an LRV this low (9.0), a room relies entirely on its fixtures; the paint gives nothing back. Warm bulbs pull the yellow-green undertone forward, close to the surface; daylight bulbs flatten it back into something closer to plain black.

If the room already has purples in the floor, a rug, or the furniture, this color will fight it rather than sit well beside it - the two sit at opposite ends of the color spectrum, which is exactly why they clash instead of blend.

Warm metals - brass, aged gold, unlacquered fixtures - gain a contrast against this that they do not have against a lighter wall; it is a common reason people choose a color this deep in the first place. A natural scheme here moves in three clear steps: this color on the main wall, a noticeably lighter mid-tone for a second wall or built-in, and a near-white on the ceiling. Each jump should be obvious at a glance, not something you have to squint to tell apart (roughly 9.0, 47 and 85 on the light-reflectance scale, for reference).

It belongs on a feature wall in a room that already has light to spare, rather than on every wall of a room that needs brightening. Sherwin-Williams Mysterious Mauve pairs well as a second surface - close enough in feel to belong in the same room, far enough in lightness to read as two distinct walls (about 28.1 points apart on the reflectance scale).

If the wall has any texture or repair work, matte is worth the trade-off even though it holds up to less scrubbing than a satin or eggshell.

For anyone tied to a different brand, Benjamin Moore Boreal Forest (AF-480) is the nearest stand-in, at a delta-E of 1.15. This is a relatively uncrowded spot in the spectrum - just 2 colors from other brands come this close.

It is lighter than 8 percent of the Kilz range. This is a crowded part of the scale - 442 colors measure within a point of 9.0 - so most brands will have something close. Kilz lists it in the TB codes, alongside 99 other colors.