The Perfect COLOUR

No matter how many times they tried decorating, they just couldn’t get it quite right

- Linda Lewis

People say that moving is one of the most stressful things you can do in life. In our case, the stress started after we moved in.

Our plan was to buy the house first and get married later. That way, we could have most of the decorating done before the wedding, and come back from our honeymoon to a bright new home.

We were lucky. My flat sold within five days and we found our ideal home not long afterwards. Two good-sized bedrooms and just far enough from the centre of town to be quiet, but close enough so that I could walk to work if I wanted to. What was even better, the house was empty, so there was no chain.

We didn’t have much furniture. Nick’s place was rented, fully furnished and I only had a one bedroom flat, so we hired ‘a man with a van’ to help us move.

‘Put the bed in the back bedroom,’ he told the man on removal day. ‘We’re decorating the front bedroom first.’

I had no problem with that. It was what we’d agreed on.

The front bedroom was by far the nicest. It had a large bay window, with views out over the city. It was clean and tidy too. The carpet was beige, which would go with anything. All we needed to do was give the walls a fresh lick of paint.

I thought it would only take a few hours.

I was wrong.

We spent the first evening in our new home surrounded by boxes, poring over colour charts.

‘How do you fancy Dusky Rose?’ Nick asked me at last.