How To Add Color To A White Kitchen

Idea House Kitchen

Credit: Laurey W. Glenn

With open flooring plans at peak popularity, kitchens are no longer strictly reserved for cooking. As guests hang out on bar stools and family conversations unfold over the island, your home's gathering space should mirror the life that happens there. Kitchen designers ditched the utilitarian arroyo a while ago, and then information technology'south high time you bring some color into yours. Although we'll always take an affinity for a classic white kitchen, there's also space for happy yellows and cool dejection, whether those fun colors come in the grade of brightly-hued dishtowels or a total cabinet makeover. Peruse these 30 vibrant kitchens to bust out of a neutral rut with flying colors.

Add Natural Elements

Kitchen: Simple with White

Credit: Photo: Laurey W. Glenn

White subway tile is a classic backdrop that's not going anywhere. But why not dial it up with a big bowl of bright green apples or yellow lemons? Other options: Place a leafy houseplant on your counter, or make a addiction of bringing domicile fresh flowers from the grocery. If yous tin't continue plants live for long, just go false! We promise you won't regret investing in a realistic-looking artificial houseplant.

Select Geometric Flooring Tile

2021 Thought Business firm Rear Kitchen/Pantry

Credit: Marta Xochilt Perez; Styling: Page Mullins

Although the colors of these tiles aren't bright, the visual diversity and geometric blueprint delivers floor-level flare. The pendant lights overhead echo the color of the darkest tile, giving this white kitchen an enviably custom feel. Look for other opportunities to pull in color—similar the painted open shelving in the pantry space seen hither.

Throw Downward a Brilliant Rug

Galley kitchen with bluish cabinetry and white walls

Credit: Julia Lynn; Styling: Dakota Willimon

Nosotros love the brilliant blue pigment on these cabinets (and the way the color is carried over to the window frames). But if yous're not prepare for an in-your-face cabinet color, consider laying down a vibrantly patterned carpet in your kitchen. A runner fits a galley space similar this i well, while small rectangular rugs are ever at dwelling in front of a sink. Beloved the look? Apply the rug's colors equally inspiration for a bold chiffonier hue.

Employ Wallpaper in Lieu of a Backsplash

Pocket-size Infinite Kitchen with Blue and White Wallpaper

Credit: Laura Negri Childers

Wallpaper has made a serious comeback, and we're here for information technology. Whether you wallpaper the whole kitchen or just one wall, the correct blueprint can set the tone of your whole infinite: Go for floral to add a feminine touch or geometric for a more than modern look. If you don't have a backsplash (or the cash to coughing up for expensive tile), you lot can fill the void with pretty paper.

Create a Colorful Nook

Assuming Wallpaper

Credit: Annie Schlechter; Styling: Matthew Gleason

If your kitchen table tucks into a corner, add a bench or window seat for a low-cost update with big-time impact. Highlight the nook with a funky wallpaper accent wall and bright pillows. Can't fit a bench into your eat-in area? Replace caput-of-the-table chairs with bold club chairs, pigment your wooden seating in a diverseness of colors, or merely switch up your chair cushions.

Choice a Vivid Backsplash

White kitchen with lite teal backsplash

Credit: Laurey Westward. Glenn; Styling: Heather Chadduck Hillegas

We get it: White cabinets are classic and eternally gorgeous. So practise the white kitchen affair—but become bold with a backsplash that isn't white, biscuit, or greyness. We honey this sea foam subway tile backplash, which is clean-looking and endlessly eye-communicable. If you're nervous to accept the leap, bring dwelling a few tile samples, prop 'em upwardly, and await at them at different times of day (when the low-cal varies) for a calendar week or two. A clear winner will sally.

Display Your Cookbooks

Dream Kitchen Design Ideas: Cookbook Shelf

Credit: Alexandra Rowley; Design: Kevin Walsh; Styling: Olga Naiman

Even if you're not an avid melt, you probably have countless cookbooks lying effectually, so why not make use of them in your kitchen design? Have off the doors of a couple cabinets to create open up shelving, and line up your cookbooks for a colorful (and conveniently accessible) display. Sort past color if yous recollect the shelf looks too cluttered.

Pick a Punchy Cabinet Color

Idea House Kitchen

Credit: Laurey W. Glenn

Does this kitchen go out you green with envy? Us as well. Although painting your kitchen cabinets in an atypical colour is a daring move, it promises attention-grabbing results in the all-time possible way. We tin't help but smile when nosotros enter a kitchen with colorful cabinets, which is why we're all for going green, blue, grayness, or whatever other color you lot love.

Chalk It Up

Meg Lonergan Houston Craftsman Kitchen

Credit: Photo: Hector Manuel Sanchez; Styling: Barbara Schmidt

In this kitchen, the homeowners went all in with a chalkboard splashed beyond the back of their peninsula. But smaller doses of chalk paint tin can be equally fun: Consider spraying a rectangular department of a blank wall as a identify for your footling ones to add together color and creativity to the kitchen. You lot tin also spray a pantry door to create a calendar or menu lath.

Install Floating Shelves

Amie Corely Kitchenette Dining Area

Credit: Ashley Gieseking

In this railroad vehicle house, low ceilings limited the options for up-top kitchen storage. Floating shelves presented an easy-to-install solution—and an attractive one, with shiny gilded brackets and a colorful display of dishes wrapping around the corner. Even if you lot accept aplenty space for full-size cabinets, installing a run of open shelving lets you lot play with natural materials, similar reclaimed wood and metal, and likewise bear witness off your prettiest pieces. Cabinets with drinking glass fronts are another fashion to showcase brightly-hued items.

Add Artwork

Jessica Stambaugh designed galley kitchen with apartment-size appliances and white cabinetry

Credit: Alison Gootee; Styling: Suzonne Stirling

Whether you pick a painting, an erstwhile map, a cool print, or a creation from a picayune ane, a piece of fine art is an easy way to add together lots of color. If your kitchen doesn't take a backsplash, prop up a framed painting instead, or hang a plate backside the stovetop, as seen in this petite apartment kitchen. The best part: Yous tin can switch your art out with the seasons (or whenever your inner designer demands it).

Paint the Ceiling

Colorful Kitchen

Credit: Photography Laurey W. Glenn / Styling Leigh Anne Montgomery

For an easy way to add color, look to the sky. A painted ceiling requires less commitment than painted cabinets, and if you get with a soft blue hue, information technology can make a small space look bigger past drawing the eye upward. Save stand up-out colors for large or loftier-ceilinged kitchens.

Play with Pendants

Patterned Kitchen Pendant Lighting

Credit: Colleen Duffley

Pendants that pop are beautiful, fresh, and fun. Cloth shades tin easily be swapped out if your style changes, so don't be afraid to play with pattern. These floral pendants inject a dose of the unexpected into this biscuit kitchen, while metallic or glass lighting can bring a touch of warmth and texture to your infinite.

Buy Vintage-Inspired Appliances

600 Square Foot Beach Cottage White Kitchen with Teal Smeg Fridge

Credit: Joseph de Leo; Styling: Liz Strong

If this fridge doesn't make you swoon, we don't know what volition. Appliances now come in well-nigh every color from vivid orange to mint green to navy blue, frequently with a vintage flare that plays well with timeless features like subway tile or forest flooring. If you're nervous almost purchasing a vivid blue stove, commencement with smaller items like a colorful stand mixer or toaster.

Choice Assuming Countertops

Lindsey Coral Harper Windsor, FL Makeover Green Kitchen White Cabinets

Credit: Photo: Laurey W. Glenn; Styling: Buffy Hargett Miller

Scan the warehouse of whatsoever countertop company, and you'll be stunned by the amount of color, sparkle, and blueprint you discover. Don't be agape to take 1 domicile: Whether you merely outfit your island or go wall-to-wall with color, you lot'll love cooking atop such a striking surface. Before you have the leap, cheque out a few full slabs to ensure you'll love the look for years.

Advertizing

Splurge on Barstools

Blue and White Kitchen with Serena and Lily Barstools

Credit: Photograph: Reagan Elizabeth Photography; Design: Kim Armstrong Interior Design

Some people want to slide their barstools nether the counter and forget they're in that location. We're non those people. We love these blue-and-white bistro barstools, which coordinate beautifully with the bluish island and vent hood. If yous already have stools, consider repurposing them with colorful cushions or a bright glaze of paint.

Make Windows a Focal Signal

Kitchen island in 2017 Idea House in Newport, Rhode Isle

Credit: Photo: Amy Neunsinger

Windows are an overlooked opportunity to add color, whether you hang a patterned window treatment, place flowers in the windowsill, or replace a small window with antique stained glass. If your kitchen is short on wall infinite, you can even prop a small painting on the sill.

Coat the Insides of Cabinets

Green kitchen cabinet

Credit: Laurey W. Glenn

Painting within the cabinets is less risky than redoing the doors. Choose a fun color you wouldn't dream of painting the exterior, or for a jewel-box feel, coat the interiors with the aforementioned hue equally the exterior (then add together a few strip lights to illuminate your treasures). To make your people's republic of china stand up out, pick a color that contrasts with your dishes.

Don't Desert the Island

Mobile Kitchen Isle

Credit: Helen Norman

If you have an island in your kitchen, it'due south quite literally the center of attention. Shouldn't it be beautiful? The adept news: With an island, you tin pull off pretty much any color you lot please. Only brand sure the shade complements the colour of your floor. If you don't have an island, buy a rolling cart similar this one and jazz it upwards with a fun (and easily changeable) hue.

Hang a Corkboard

Family Command Middle: Getting Started

Credit: Photo by Laurey W. Glenn

For a pop of color that isn't permanent, pigment the frame of a corkboard and hang it on a cabinet or wall in your kitchen. Kids' artwork and family unit pictures will congregate here; it'due south also a great spot to hang a agenda or store local takeout menus. If you become tired of the color you chose, simply have the corkboard down and grab a new tin can of spray paint.

Deck Out Your Hardwoods

2021 Idea House Kitchen with Painted Floors

Credit: Marta Xochilt Perez; Styling: Page Mullins

We'll admit it—painting over hardwood floors is a modest sin, merely if yours are in rough shape or you don't like the stain (and you can't afford refinishing), information technology can be an incredible way to upgrade your floor. Solid colors works although we're partial to a large-scale geometric pattern like this i, which pairs absurd hues with creamy white. This look also works well on concrete floors.

Advertizement

Show Off the Practiced China

Red china Cabinet with Striped Fabric

Credit: Photograph: Laurey Due west. Glenn

Gorgeous red china shouldn't spend its life locked away. We vote to revive the former-schoolhouse china cabinet. Find 1 at a secondhand store, paint the outside, and wallpaper the within. If yous don't accept room for another piece of piece of furniture, try hanging plates or trays right on the wall or create a display with floating shelves.

Dress Upward the Dish Towels

Butcher Block Counter Summit

Credit: Photo: Laurey West. Glenn; Styling: Elizabeth Demos

Although it's only a tiny piece of cloth, a well-placed dish towel can accept a big bear on. Hither, a striped ane transforms a creamy kitchen into a French chef's abode. Accessible and inexpensive, dish towels are one of our favorite ways to bring color to the kitchen, whether y'all modify them out a few times a yr or whenever the mood strikes.

Refresh Your Walls

White Kitchen with green walls and corner breakfast nook

Credit: Mary Britton Senseney; Styling by Dakota Willimon

This i may seem obvious, but we're guessing so you're used to the color on your kitchen walls that y'all barely consider information technology. But before you turn your attention to your cabinets, truly take in that wall colour: Would a fresh coat of paint transform the space and renew your dearest for the other finishes? Does the undertone of your wall color match that of your cabinets? If they aren't working together, your kitchen will look hodgepodge, but with the right wall color, even so-then cabinets can shine.

Display Your Pots

Colonial Cottage Kitchen Gray Paint Copper Details

Credit: Laurey W. Glenn

If you have a collection of copper pots, you have a ready-made road to color in your kitchen. Hang them on the wall with hooks, or dangle them overhead with an over-the-island rack. The metallic shine is nil brusk of gorgeous.

Take the Backsplash to a Wall

2018 idea House in Austin, Texas Kitchen

Credit: Photo: Hector Manuel Sanchez; Styling: Buffy Hargett Miller

By itself, this square tile backsplash backside the stove would serve equally a lovely focal point—a splash of color in an otherwise neutral space. Simply taken to the next wall, it becomes the room'south defining characteristic, transforming this traditional kitchen into a statement maker. If you're installing a colorful backsplash, look for another tile-ready spot in your kitchen, like the fractional wall hither or the expanse above your sink. Bright tile looks peculiarly stunning around a small window.

Get Retro

Retro Pinkish and Blue Kitchen

Credit: Deborah Whitlaw Llewellyn

Acknowledge information technology: This pastel kitchen makes you smile. From the light pink appliances to the baby blue drawers and doors to the matching accessories, this retro galley kitchen takes every opportunity to accept fun. Although nigh of the kitchen—the upper cabinets, the flooring, the calorie-free, the ceiling—is white, the space feels like a wonderland of soft color, cheers to pastel paints, which are whimsical simply never chaotic.

Advert

Install Pantry Bins

2018 Idea House in Austin, Texas Pantry

Credit: Photo: Hector Manuel Sanchez; Styling: Buffy Hargett Miller

In our 2018 Idea Firm in Austin, Texas, designer Meredith Ellis recreated old-fashioned grain bins past installing drawers with glass fronts. Not only are they functional, only they're bright and cute when filled with stale beans. Turn a nook in your kitchen into an open up pantry, and if you aren't able to add glass fronts to the drawers, mimic the look with big clear glass jars filled with beans or pasta.

Create a Fun Characteristic Wall

patterned kitchen backsplash

Credit: Getty Images

If you simply saw the island of this kitchen, you'd probably describe the space as modernistic, sleek, possibly even sterile. Only turn your eye to the blue tiled wall, and in that location'due south no question that this kitchen is filled with life. The mix of patterns makes every inch interesting, and the floating shelf breaks up the wall, without detracting from the beauty of the geometric tile.

Cull a Glam Vent Hood

Margaret Kirkland Georgian Makeover Blue and White Kitchen

Credit: Photograph: Hector Manuel Sanchez; Styling: Buffy Hargett Miller

Yes, your vent hood is by and large there to hide a necessary accompaniment to your range. But it can as well be an opportunity for a moment of levity. In this case, oxidized copper borrows from the the blue color of the backsplash, creating a place for the heart to rest in a sea of white cabinets. Whether yous wrap yours in metallic or coat it in colorful pigment, decking out the vent hood can requite your kitchen a custom vibe without changing the cabinets.

Up Next