Exterior cottage walls are a canvas for colorful paints.
The fairytale quality of a cottage seems to invite fantasy exterior paint. Perhaps it is all those colorful flowers in the overcrowded garden or the sense of whimsy that goes with decorating a classic cottage. Subdued or uninhibited, most cottages are as interesting on the outside as they hint at being on the inside.
Small Cottages, Big Attitude
A simple cottage with sage shingles and a brick stoop breaks out with buttery yellow trim on the porch pillars, two double-hung window frames and the front door frame. The stoop and porch are fire engine red as is the door. The roof is shingled in a faded, old-brick color that matches the real brick chimney and is echoed in a vine-covered wood slat fence next to the chimney. The compact cottage is so symmetrical and so neatly colored that it looks like a perfect dollhouse on its generous, grassy lot. An asymmetrical and sharply angled cottage on a tiny lot barely wider than the house has bold, grape-purple shingles and blinding white trim edging the gables, roof, small windows, wood door canopy and simple wooden steps. An unmissable color choice---the house might seem diminutive, but there is nothing shy about it.
A Sunny, Bright Florida Cottage
An old central Florida stucco cottage with fat columns on a wide porch sits squat and secure under a tree dripping in Spanish moss. The two-story house rambles from the front yard with its white picket fence back into the trees but it isn't shadowed. The stucco inside and out is painted bright sunflower yellow, including the chimney. The half columns, roof edges, door and window trim match the white fence. Touches of cherry red contrast with the sunny paint, and the porch floors, front and back, are natural, worn cedar. A red door, red mailbox and lush subtropical greenery keep the cottage from looking like a confection and echo the inside color scheme, which is also yellow with lots of white, splashes of red and green and polished, rock-hard Florida pine floors. This cottage is cheerful but looks solid enough to withstand a hurricane or two, which it undoubtedly has over the years.
An Updated Victorian Dowager
Something about a cottage inspires the frequent application of fresh paint, and that crisp look is a classic. A New England Victorian cottage from 1895 is quite possibly a dowager but is far from dumpy. A careful renovation has periwinkle blue shingles on all the walls and slate gray shingles on the roof. The many windows and gable edges, as well as the covered entry, are trimmed in white, and two dormers on an upper floor, set back on either side of the house, are painted completely white. The picket fence and swinging gate are white, naturally, and the soft green lawn is overrun near the front of the house by a cottage garden of multi-hued flowering bushes and wildflowers. This is a large house backed by mature trees, and its garage and sheds are all painted to mimic the main cottage. But despite its side wings, back extensions and three floors, the cottage manages to look simple due to the absence of a front porch and the clean but subdued exterior color scheme.
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