Crazy Office Accent Wall!

So since I am working on my office/playroom I thought I would explain how our accent wall came about! I get questions about it all of the time, and I can actually admit that I never intended it to be an accent wall!!!

We were headed to the paint store, and my husband had picked blue for the office.... *gulp*... I am not a blue fan, and I don't mean light blue, oh no, he wanted full on slap you in the face blue. Well as we were arguing, I mean, discussing, paint colors, I started to browse through those paint sample idea books they have. And viola' my inspiration! If it had to be blue then it had to be fabulous, and this idea (to me anyway) was indeed fabulous!

Of course I wasn't doing purple, it was BLUE, I mean, blue.... ;^)... We selected a total of 5 shades, from dark to light all in the same color family. Make sure you take your time and lay each color next to the other and make sure it is something that is pleasing to the eye. (couldn't find the samples online so all of these pictures are scanned in, I apologize for the quality).
I got a quart of each, except for the wall color (We had a ton left over, for money saving you may want to purchase a few of those small sample containers instead, depends on how big of a space you are doing). Now this is where we made a mistake, yes I am admitting to a mistake, you may want to document this. I let Michael's well wishing for blue get the best of me and we picked Merlin's Magic for the rest of the walls...If you are doing an accent wall that is this dramatic make the rest of the walls relatively neutral. (We later repainted the three walls, not the accent wall, a sandy beige which went perfect with the blue, see previous post).
Now the most important step in my opinion is to draw a diagram and label it, you can't just start slapping paint anywhere.

That huge jumbled mess is my diagram :^) And yes I can read it, (it's on the back of an old grocery list).... After this you need to pick the order of your colors, and make sure you have good painters tape, and a level. Draw the diagram on the wall, and start painting one by one. A good rule of thumb for taking the tape off is to do it slowly, pull evenly, and do it (CAREFULLY) while the paint is still tacky, otherwise it may come off a bit (Make sure before you take the tape off that there are enough coats in the square, I have two coats done on mine). You may still need to do touch ups, don't worry it's normal. This took me two days simply because there were so many colors, and although you can take paint off when it is tacky you don't want to lay it on tacky paint, so the drying time causes the wait.

Don't be intimidated, make sure you draw a diagram, and if it helps you put a small X on the wall in each area in the color it will be. Trust me it's easier than you think!!! So go figure out where you can make a big impact in your home!!! And please don't hesitate to ask if you have any questions, Happy Painting! <3