The prestigious palette

Wine snobs, step aside: There’s a new breed of aesthetes who believe that a bottle of rosé is a bottle of rosé, but a can of Sydney Harbour “La Vie En Rose” is intoxicating. These are the enthusiasts who get high on the color, clarity and depth of household paint.

Paint?

Well, not quite the interior latex you’d find at the corner hardware store. With prices starting at $45 per gallon, you might prefer to call it an “architectural finish,” as does Michael Kahn, proprietor of Sydney Harbour Paint Co.

Last year, Americans spent $131 million on premium wall coatings. That’s a drop in the bucket compared to the $7.6 billion annually spent on household paint, but this high-end niche market is growing at twice the rate of the industry, according to the Paint and Decorating Retailers Assn.

In Southern California, where homes are as much fashion statements as clothing and cars, sales are brisk. Los Angeles is the largest market for the Vermont-based Fine Paints of Europe, which produces a Martha Stewart collection.

Ironically, many of these grand, new wall finishes have common roots, dating centuries to the European peasant class. These humble folks painted their homes in various combinations of milk, lime, chalk, pigments, binder and water, creating surface textures that took on a rich patina over time. This organic, gently distressed finish has captured the fancy of contemporary designers and do-it-yourselfers who for years attempted to replicate the look with modern latex paints.

Now, boutique manufacturers such as the Los Angeles-based companies Sydney Harbour and Portola combine old-fashioned ingredients with modern manufacturing technology to put the look in a can. The resulting finishes are ideally suited for sunny Los Angeles.

Premium paint manufacturers say they create the most vibrant or subtle shades through custom pigmentation that Home Depot can’t replicate. And it’s color that’s driving the surge of interest in luxury wall coatings.

“Of all the reader e-mails we get, more are queries regarding paint color than anything else,” says Margaret Russell, editor in chief of Elle Decor. The magazine recently featured a bathroom painted oxblood from the trendy New York-based Donald Kaufman Color Collection. A dining room in the same residence was done in “Mouse’s Back,” a mossy gray by the traditional English paint manufacturer Farrow & Ball, which earlier this year opened its first West Coast showroom in Los Angeles on Melrose Avenue.

“We’ve always been known as the place to go for the right color,” says Martin Ephson, a co-owner of Farrow & Ball. The company bases its selections on antique color cards and paints developed for restorations of British National Trust homes. “We produce the shades we do because they work with traditional or contemporary decorating schemes. That’s why they’ve survived.”

The trend toward period decorating began more than a decade ago. Major paint manufacturers were slow to respond, opening the window for old firms such as Farrow & Ball and newcomers including Donald Kaufman, who created custom colors for contemporary architectural projects.

During the last few years, notes decor specialist Judith Miller, author of “The Style Sourcebook,” “there has been a move away from the purist approach to period decorating. People are drawing inspiration from palettes from other regions, like the hot ‘candy’ colors traditionally associated with rural Mexican architecture and the earth-pigmented colors of the Mediterranean.”

This is welcome news for Susan Sargent, author of “The Comfort of Color,” who developed Grover Farm, a collection for Fine Paints of Europe. “For the last 50 years we have been in a dull cycle color-wise with neutrals and chilly white interiors,” she says. “People have had it with that boring plain thing. Now if you want fuchsia and lime green, these high-end paints have much greater proportions of numbers of pigments in them as opposed to the universal tints that most manufacturers use. With luxury paints, you get these little specks of color that reflect when light comes onto the wall and that gives you something special.”

For those who use premium paints, this seemingly subtle difference is worth every penny. Commercial paints often look muddy because black and white are used to make colors darker and lighter. Although the cost of reproducing the antique formulas may be high, the results are more dramatic. The ground-up limestone in a lime wash reacts with carbon dioxide to create crystals that absorb and reflect light, so the color changes throughout the day.

The market for luxury paint is built on such special effects. Metallic blends have a satiny sheen. Distemper has a powdery soft surface. Venetian plaster — these days, that might be dry-wall mud impregnated with pigment — is applied with a trowel and then sanded and polished relentlessly to resemble marble. Paint made with ground stone evokes a sparkling vista of wind-swept sand.

Shelter magazines and décor TV have lavished attention on these lush, photogenic paints.

Retail is also responding. Many Southern California stores now carry Donald Kaufman Colors, which are made in New York, and Fine Paints of Europe from Woodstock, Vt. The Los Angeles showroom of the London-based Farrow & Ball also serves as a retail outlet and is specifically designed to show how various shades look under artificial and natural light. In addition, it offers hand-painted swatch cards and sells small pots with enough paint to cover a 3-foot-square section of a wall. Priced at $5, the annual global sales for these samples are well over a million pots, Ephson says.

The nesting juggernaut has created an educated consumer, who is more likely to appreciate that the higher-priced spreads are Earth friendly. With some of the strictest laws on the books, California limits the sale of oil-based paints, generally considered to be superior in quality and durability. The new water-based boutique paints have some of the lowest ratings for volatile organic compounds, or VOC, on the market.

“They aren’t smelly,” says Portola’s Rizal Coleman, “and they don’t give me a gnarly headache.”

So what if they’re expensive. “They’re really an investment in your family’s health,” argues Organic Style editor Jeanie Pyun. “It’s nice to know that you can have beautiful colors and interesting surfaces without bringing more chemicals home.”

Sticker shock remains the big obstacle. “Everybody likes a bargain,” observes John Lahey, founder of Fine Paints of Europe. “But that $12 gallon of wall paint with a milkshake consistency is basically chalk and water.” The only federal and state standard that commercial paint manufacturers have to observe, he says, is not to use mercury and lead.

“I could open a factory in L.A. making red paint out of ketchup and water and be completely compliant with every regulation in the U.S.,” he says.

Lahey, who in 1987 started the firm that now produces Martha’s Fine Paints, is an advocate for quality control. “I’m old enough to remember what a great paint job looked like,” he says. “We now have three generations who have never seen one.”

The shift began with the advent of acrylic and latex paints in the early 1950s. They were user-friendly, but cheap, with built-in obsolescence for a new generation that changed residences more often and, consequently, painted more frequently.

In the midst of a shaky economy with sky-high real estate prices, today’s homeowners are more likely than ever to invest in high-quality finishes. “Homes are fashion statements and we’re seeing a return to elegance,” says Farrow & Ball’s Ephson. “Even though the redecorating cycle is shorter than the life span of paint, there still is no cheaper, more dramatic way to transform a room.”

The argument is even more compelling if you paint by numbers, setting your budget for long-term value. According to Nick Cichielo, chief executive of the Paint and Decorating Retailers Assn., over 85% of the charges on a contracted paint job are for labor. The average room requires three cans of paint. The average gallon of paint costs $18.67. If you specify three cans of $50-a-gallon premium paint — which tends to cover more square feet and requires fewer coats — the additional cost will be less than $100 per room.

While Sydney Harbour’s Kahn observes that a fresh coat of couture paint “can give your house a 10% to 15% additional valuation,” the decision is more emotional than economical. “Why would a person spend that kind of money on a can of paint?” Kahn asks. “For the same reason a person would buy a good bottle of wine or a gourmet meal. The beauty of it enriches your life.”

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It’s a world of color out there

Some of the stores and manufacturers offering the new wall finishes:

Woodland Hills

(818) 765-2629

Santa Monica

(310) 393-7208

Cox Paint Center

11153 Washington Blvd.

Culver City

(310) 838-2284

Décor

2820 Thousand Oaks Blvd.

Thousand Oaks

(805) 495-7097

Farrow & Ball

8475 Melrose Ave.

West Hollywood

(323) 655-4499

Los Angeles

(323) 664-9067

Los Angeles

(213) 413-4950

Studio City

(818) 623-9053

Redondo Beach

(310) 540-4456

(800) 852-3254

(818) 623-9053

(213) 228-8440

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Old methods for a new look

When it comes to interior paint, the choices used to be simple: flat for walls, gloss for trim. Now there’s a world of do-it-yourself (and seek-professional-help) options that provide striking textures. Here’s a look at the results of the new finish lines:

Satin

Color: Capricorn Royal Satin by Portola, $62 per gallon

Appearance: A pearlescent paint, satin shades look brighter or darker depending on how light strikes it. This reflective quality also affects the appearance of the glimmering finish, which fluctuates between flat and semi-gloss in changing light.

Application: Most commonly used as a trim paint, satin is a little more difficult to apply to walls than ordinary flat latex. Brushstrokes are visible, so apply with a steady hand and an artistic eye.

Milk paint

Color: Turquoise by Sydney Harbour, $32 per kilogram (2.2 pounds)

Appearance: Also known as casein, this lactose-based paint was popular in the 18th and 19th centuries for its opaque shades and soft sheen that ages attractively, especially on wood. Superior for period colors in colonial, Scandinavian interiors.

Application: Made with powdered milk, casein must be strained and cannot be stored because it sours. Though walls can be gently cleaned, a protective finish is highly recommended.

Lime wash

Color: Fire Kiln by Portola, $45 per gallon

Appearance: Made with powdered limestone, this old-fashioned formula offers saturated color that mellows over time. The lime “blooms” at the surface, creating a patchy field of subtly mottled color. Providing texture, lime wash is ideal for re-creating the aged look found in French farmhouses and Mediterranean villas.

Application: Ideal for first-time painters, lime wash requires no special technique, only two coats of crisscrossed strokes with a large block brush.

Tuscan wash

Color: Vegas by Portola, $59 per gallon

Appearance: Delicately broken color reminiscent of stone and aged terra cotta, this finish suits classical Spanish and Mediterranean architecture as well as contemporary decor schemes.

Application: A two-step, two-person process, wash is painted in broad strokes with a wide brush as a darker finishing coat of color. The water-based formula has a slower drying time to allow some of the paint to be “ragged” off with a wad of muslin, creating the two-tone effect.

Metallic

Color, Liquid Copper by Sydney Harbour, $90 per liter

Appearance: Copper particles suspended in an acrylic paint base create a rich, reflective metallic surface. With the addition of a patina solution ($25 for 500 ml.) the copper can be made to corrode to a soft-green finish.

Application: Often used on wooden surfaces to match weathered copper, this two-step process (paint, then brush on liquid patina activator) is also used for doors and trim. For interior walls, it provides a rough-hewn, dramatically colored finish.

Distemper

Color: Mulberry stain by Sydney Harbour, $58 per gallon

Appearance: Finely ground chalk and powdered pigments yield delicate yet saturated colors and a velvety look that softens with age. The creamy matte finish adds a cozy warmth to Old World and modern room designs.

Application: One of the oldest paint recipes is also one of the easiest to apply. Despite modern additives that increase durability, the plush finish of distemper, ideal for ceilings, can be a maintenance issue for homeowners with children.

Venetian plaster

Color: Topaz Roman clay by Portola, $45 per kilogram (2.2 pounds)

Appearance: Devised as a way to add a polished-stone look to surfaces where marble can not be laid, this wall finish exudes a cool and classical elegance.

Application: This ancient process — updated by adding pigment to acrylic plaster — is not recommended for the impatient. Venetian plaster is troweled on, then skim-coated. After drying, smooth with fine sandpapers. A final coat of beeswax protects the wall and can be buffed to a highly polished shine.

Glaze

Color: Lime and soda Venetian glaze by Sydney Harbour, $64 per gallon

Appearance: This high-gloss wash adds intensity, translucency and shine to surfaces painted with a low-sheen acrylic color. Commonly used as a textural antiquing medium, glaze can also imitate the 21st century glamour of lacquered walls.

Application: This water-based topcoat, which mimics traditional oil glazes, can be manipulated with rags, sponges and brushes. With a relatively quick drying time, it is a process best practiced by two people.