.

[Leroy]

I'd tear the whole place down and put up a strip mall.

Americana baby.

[TimeForGuinness]

I'd tear the whole place down and put up a strip mall.

Americana baby.

True...or she could start hanging random things on the walls (skiis, trumpets, etc) and start selling baby back ribs.

/flare

[StatmanCrothers]

mirrors.

[docellis]

-

[Popeye_Card]

They sell some different strippers that will take paint right off of brick. The stuff I have comes in a plastic bucket, kinda like joint compound, and it's a bit pasty. You spread that on, wait for a couple hours, and it comes right off.

My recommendation is to keep the brick unpainted if possible, and dress up the room by painting the other walls. IF you have to paint, IMO I hate all painted brick except white or off-white. So that's what I would go with, and then paint your other walls with a nice color that contrasts against the brick.

Right now, the brick dominates the room because that's the big color. You want the brick to be an interesting bold accent that is noticed, but you don't want it to dominate.

In review, here are my recommendations in order:

1.) Strip the brick, paint the other walls something more interesting than white.
2.) Paint the brick white. Paint the other walls a dark tan.
3.) Never paint brick red. That looks the worst because then it just looks fake.

BONUS: Paint that door (and trim) going to the garage too. Preferably white, unless you paint the bricks white. Then I don't know. All I know right now is that the door doesn't do you any favors for making anything else in the room look better.

[docellis]

[quote="
BONUS:

[JL21]

I think a sage would look terrible, but that's just me. I like the idea of a khaki or chocolate brown. Or a good deep red- something like PMS 1817. For khaki, go 4535 and for chocolate brown, go 4625.

[Popeye_Card]

I think KY was right, it is the brick pattern not painted brick.
I painted the brick wall Mt. Olive. It looks horrible. It won't stay that color. But My other walls are white and I can't paint them so I need to think of another color. I do plan on painting (or replacing) the garage door at some point though.

I thought it looked like the pattern too, but I wasn't sure. I don't have a huge issue with the brick as-is, but something needs to be done to keep it from dominating.

Important question: I know the background of your house situation, but why can you paint the bricks and doors (which are harder to reverse), but not paint the walls or change the flooring (which is easy to change)?

If the walls have to stay white, I'd go with white on the bricks, then do some interesting shelves in black on that wall, with some b&w pictures.

[docellis]

[quote

[Popeye_Card]

I think a sage would look terrible, but that's just me. I like the idea of a khaki or chocolate brown. Or a good deep red- something like PMS 1817. For khaki, go 4535 and for chocolate brown, go 4625.

Well I went for a sage-ish color and it looks awful. It also doesn't look sage-ish though. It looks like a post-it note. Or the color of walls in a school cafeteria.

HORRIBLE. But temporary.

That actually doesn't look all that bad, I don't think (just going by the picture).

Another suggestion I would have is to flank your fireplace with some semi-tall (~4-5 feet) furniture of some sort to take away some of the wall space. Bookshelves, a taller TV stand, etc. What would look best is a flat screen above the fireplace with bookshelves on each side, but then you'd have to get a flat screen and get power/cable to it.