Brick CAN Be Painted: How We Updated Our House

Sometimes opportunity, necessity, and a refund from a canceled spring break can all fall into your lap at just the right time. This was exactly what happened for our 1960s-built home that was in terrible need of a refresh. We had already committed to replacing and painting all of our house trim this summer, when I remembered how much I loved how a neighbor’s house was completely reborn when they chose to paint it all one color.

Our house was originally very 1968 (the year it was built) with its orange brick and mustard-yellow siding. We never loved this combo, but making any cosmetic changes to the exterior have always been pretty far down on our priority list.

But this spring, we reached out to our painter to give us an estimate to paint the trim. While he was over, we also asked him to price out painting the whole rest of the house. To our surprise, it was very affordable.

To be honest, I wasn’t sure where our painter would start or how long this would even take. He began by giving the entire place a good power wash. This stripped away a lot of the grime, and made it very clear where the wood trim needed to be replaced.

From there, almost all on his own, our painter tackled the trim, the siding, and then the brick–taking about two weeks from start to finish. The hardest part was having to rebuild and replace a good amount of our trim work. That, and the three coats of paint the bricks took. (He applied the paint with a roller…I had no idea that an entire house could be painted this way!)

Painting our house all one color has been such a wow to us! Our palette was inspired by our favorite home in downtown East Lake Forest. One day, I left a message in their mailbox and asked if the would share the colors they used and I received a text with just those later that day. (I love this town!) I have two sisters-in-law who are incredibly talented when it comes to design and do-it-yourself and they both signed off on our choices:

Exterior color: Benjamin Moore Swiss Coffee, OC-45

Trim color: Benjamin Moore Distant Gray, 2124-70

Shutter color: Benjamin Moore Hamilton Blue, HC-191

While our exterior is just about finished, a new front door and new garage door have been ordered to arrive soon. Next up will likely be a badly needed new roof and some smaller landscaping to replace what’s overgrown around the front of the house, but we’ll have to pace ourselves a bit with these updates.

We’re so happy with this change! By far, it was the least intrusive, biggest impact renovation that we’ve made since we bought this house 14 years ago. We just love it! Our new motto is, when all else fails, paint it!

xo,