Pewter Moon

A background color by design, with a yellow cast that keeps it from being featureless. 8435 in the Vista Paint range.

At 6.0 on the chroma scale, this is closer to grey than to color, though the yellow cast keeps it from being either. It holds up in a north-facing room, which is where warmth is usually missing.

Light reflectance measures 64.0, which is enough to keep a room bright without bouncing light around. A practical choice for rooms that will change decor over time, since a true neutral outlasts trends in furniture and textiles.

Dunn-Edwards Lighthouse 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 26.3 points apart on the reflectance scale).

Farrow & Ball Skimming Stone (241) matches it closely enough that no one will tell them apart on a wall. This is not a rare shade: 7 colors from other brands sit within delta-E 2 of it. A satin finish is worth it in a room that needs to be wiped down often, at the cost of showing a bit more of the wall's surface than a flat finish would.

It is lighter than 67 percent of the Vista Paint range. Among grays it is one of the strongest: only 1 percent of them carry more colour. Vista Paint lists it in the K codes, alongside 1,318 other colors.