Curb Appeal

Exterior selections: choosing the type and color of materials that go on the outside. How hard can it be to find ready-made combinations of siding and shingles and shakes and stone? You find one you like and just say, "That one" or "Do what they did." How hard is that?

Answer: Hard!

The question is not "How hard can it be to pick out this stuff?" Anyone who has ever painted a room knows how far apart expectations and actual results can be when you're working with color. It's really hard. Designers exist because it's so hard. But I assumed ready-made palettes would be available and easy to find (on the Internet, at the paint store, etc.) to make the coordinating of walls and trim and stone and doors and windows effortless. Not so. Designers need paychecks, too. And if a few folks have gotten it right, really right, maybe they don't want to dilute their (lucky?) perfection by having it duplicated far and wide.

Here's the closest I've gotten to tapping a designer's skills. The stone company gave me addresses of houses with stone that I think might be okay with the siding and trim colors that I think I might choose. (Note the words "think" and "might" and "okay." Note the fear.) So I have dragged my parents and Mary around to far-flung, new housing developments, seeking harmonious palettes from the address lists. Wow, that one stone turned out to be so dark! And that one looks so orange! And phooey, that one looks like concrete. Oooh, now look at THAT house across the street--that one looks reeeeally nice, but what the heck is that stone? that siding? that trim? I pull out my camera and furtively approach the house, snap a couple of photos. I run back to the car. Dang. I should get a close-up. Mary sighs. I put on shades and pull my hat brim low, make a silent egress from the late-model sedan of indefinite color, slip around to the side of the house, take the shot, dash back, make the getaway. Five minutes later there's a police cruiser at the intersection of Blue Ridge Trail and Peaceful Valley Way.

Okay, so I have pictures of a house that got it right. But how do I know, in the universe of siding and paint and stone, what exactly is on the house? I don't. I can't. Sigh.

Wait a sec. There is one house, one quite lovely house, and I happen to know all the secret details of its curb appeal. It's the house Dan built for my friend Laurie. Maybe I'll say to Dan,"Do what they did."