Decorating and Design - need to choose kitchen colors!

hi everyone,

here's the dilemma. our bathroom has been our kitchen for 6 months....our first born is on the way in three......his room, still not converted to baby room, is now temp storage, laundry room (yes i have a drain out my window and two 25 ft garden hoses going to the water supply in the kitchen :D ) & tool shack......

the short of it, bad renovation job finally gone good but now we are stuck choosing colors (it's called renovation paralysis). we don't want to make the same mistake we did with the counter (bad grouting) & floor (uneven staining) & it's already november, :( so here we are DIY.COM, at your doorstep pleading for SPEEDY advice!!! :o


i'll do my best to paint a clear picture of our room.


ok, this is an image of the tile used for our counter. it is porcelain:

http://www.artofceramic.com/rvkcatalog/CMKY-MA-1

the floor is hardwood stained red mahogany (minwax). here's a sample color:

http://www.josephfusco.org/Articles/Blotch_Stain/blotchy_01.JPG

our kitchen table is hardwood, also stained red mahogany.

here are a couple of old pictures to get an idea. in the second picture, notice the band of wood trim halfway up the wall. this feature allows us to go two tone. what makes it even more fun is the wall below the wood trim is in a brick like pattern. it's not so evident in the pic.

http://img24.exs.cx/img24/5003/kitchen3.jpg

http://img24.exs.cx/img24/4361/kitchen2.jpg

what's not in the pics are the new porcelain counter, the new appliances (biscuit or light beige), the new table & new doors for the cabinetry.

right now the kitchen is empty. here are my questions.

1- should we go dark or light
2-should we paint the ceiling white or the same color as the upper portion of the room or a shade lighter?

for the cabinetry:

should we stay with the red mahogany theme or should we go lighter

any ideas on draperies.


thanks for any help on this.

tony

should you go dark or light? depends on what you want. do you want your kitchen dark & cozy & warm, like a paneled gentleman's library? or light & cheery? or something in between? what were your plans when you started this whole thing? you must have had some ideas when you decided to go with all the mahogany....?

i can't get to the website to see your countertop tiles - what color are they?

if all the paint choices are too overwhelming, think in terms of what can narrow them down for you (ie what your limits are), such as: (1) what colors are you using in other rooms? you want the whole house to flow. (2) is there something you have or will need to get that you can pull colors from, such as an area rug or a piece of wall art or your dish pattern, etc.?

i've said it before many times, but i'll say it again: don't try to come up with a color scheme based on nothing. don't say, "hey! let's go with this funky dark teal color!!" and then set out to find curtains & area rugs & placemats & everything else. it will be extremely difficult if you do it that way. find your "stuff" first, and then pull out a color(s) from that. for a kitchen, that will probably mean first finding a fabric or readymade window treatment. then go from there.