Gargoyle

Dark to the point where the light in the room matters more than the color does, and where that light is what reveals the red cast at all. In the Vista Paint lineup this is 0550.

11.0 on the light-reflectance scale is near the floor - this color adds shadow to a room rather than taking it away. Direct light is where the red cast actually shows - raking light across the wall, a lamp placed close, morning sun through a nearby window.

The lighter the trim beside this, the more it will seem to glow - a side effect of the light-reflectance gap rather than anything special about the trim color. 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 11.0, 48 and 85 on the light-reflectance scale, for reference).

Whole rooms in it work when the room is used mainly after dark and lit warmly rather than relying on daylight. If a second wall color is wanted in the same room, Behr Tin Foil keeps the jump obvious rather than muddy (roughly 32 LRV points from this one).

Higher-sheen finishes will bounce highlights across a wall this dark, which can read as patchy rather than deliberate - matte avoids that.

Behr Wood Acres (BXC-71) matches it closely enough that no one will tell them apart on a wall. This is not a rare shade: 4 colors from other brands sit within delta-E 2 of it.

It is lighter than 8 percent of the Vista Paint range. This is a crowded part of the scale - 546 colors measure within a point of 11.0 - so most brands will have something close. The name is not unique: Benjamin Moore 1546 and PPG 1127-4 also sell a color called Gargoyle, and it is not the same shade. Vista Paint lists it in the C codes, alongside 1,421 other colors.