When you’re in the process of remodeling or even just changing the look of your home, one thing that you may need to do is to repaint the walls of your interior or your exterior.
While of course there’s nothing wrong with going with an entirely new color, you may of course wish to opt to stay with the color that you already had — but if you don’t know precisely what kind of paint you had, what are you going to do?
This can be problematic if you moved into a house that was already painted and you want the colors to remain around the same but you don’t know how to find that specific color — that is what is known as color matching.
With that being the case, let us look at some of the useful techniques you can use for matching the colors in your home in Austin, TX in 2025.
1. Approximation
If you like the color that you see in your home but you aren’t married to it or even just realize that you’re not going to get to see the exact same color as what was there — perhaps it has been years since it was originally painted — approximation may be the way for you to match the color in your home.
Approximation basically means that you take the color with you to the paint store in some way, whether you just snap a mental picture like Alec Baldwin did in that one episode of ‘Friends’ or you take an actual photo and just take it to the paint store and look at it and the paint colors they have there and say well… this one looks about the same as the one I have at home.
It means that you aren’t getting an exact match by any means but you’re getting a close approximation.
2. Photo Analysis
If you want a closer match than an approximation, you can take a photo of the color that you want matched and take it to the paint store.
At the paint store, they should be able to take the photo you bring them and use software to analyze the colors in the image and tell you all of the paints that they have that come closest to matching that color.
It’s entirely possible that if you have a smart phone, you could find an app that would do just about the same thing but you may find it to use the paint store software simply because you are going to need to be there to get the paint anyhow, and their software will more closely match what they have in stock.
Bear in mind that the paint that you have in your home may be a proprietary blend that is not even available at the paint store so you may have to go with just a color that is close to the one that you have in your home.
3. Scrape And Analyze
For the absolutely closest match that you’re going to be able to find, you will want to take some sort of a paint scraping tool and take a little bit of the paint from your home with you in a plastic bag and have the paint store use a machine that will analyze the color closely.
Once it has done this, it should be able to determine a paint that they have in their store that will closely match if not perfectly match the paint color that you have in your home.
Of course, if the paint has faded over time you may find that the paint you ultimately get will match the color that you see at the time in your home as opposed to the possibly more vibrant color that was there when it was originally painted.
At Brush & Color Painting, we provide detailed painting estimates with all the information you need to understand your project and make the decision. If you haven’t identified a painting contractor for your project yet, we would love to be your favorite contractor.
We offer interior and cabinet eco-friendly painting services in Austin, TX, Tarrytown TX, Clarksville TX, and Westlake, TX. To use our services, book a FREE estimate or call us on (512) 947-0594 if you have any questions.