Rocky Hill

A color that sits comfortably in the middle: not so light it washes out, not so dark it needs justifying, with a blue that carries it. H0050, from Vista Paint.

Light reflectance measures 18.0, which is enough to keep a room bright without bouncing light around. A chroma of 14.7 is enough to register as a real color choice, without the intensity that would force the rest of a room to match it.

Works as a whole-room color in spaces that are lived in rather than passed through, where its depth has time to register. South light flatters it. In a north-facing room it can turn cold, so sample that wall first. Behr Silver Bullet makes a good second wall color here - different enough to read as a real choice, close enough to still feel related (about 38 points apart in light reflectance).

Worth checking before committing to a full wall: oranges and warm terracotta nearby - in a floor, a rug, a piece of furniture - will read as a clash here, not a complement, since the two colors sit at opposite ends of the spectrum.

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. The safest multi-color scheme moves from this dark wall to a noticeably lighter secondary tone, then to a near-white ceiling - three genuinely different depths rather than three shades of the same idea (LRV 18.0, 52 and 85, if you're matching by the numbers).

Switching brands, Behr Cotton Denim (HDC-FL14-11) is the closest equivalent at delta-E 1.3, near enough for most rooms. Only 2 other-brand colors land within delta-E 2 of this one, which makes it comparatively unusual. 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 16 percent of the Vista Paint range. Vista Paint lists it in the C codes, alongside 1,421 other colors.