Color Schemes for the Kitchen—Warm Colors

Although it’s easy to pick a shade we like from the color palette—and we might even have no trouble imagining our new kitchen cabinets in that color— 
it’s much harder to assess the overall look without seeing it in person, since not only do the colors need to harmonize in our kitchen, but so do the sizes of the surfaces adorned with those colors. 
So we need to think carefully about which colors we choose, since the biggest problem is that there’s a fine line between tasteful extremity and bad taste.

In the previous article, we looked at the effects that the most commonly used cool colors can have in our kitchen, as well as which colors can be used to enhance or tone down those effects.
In this article, we’ll explore the most popular warm colors and their effects.

Yellow is the color of the sun, so it can be excellent for banishing fatigue and making us feel more energetic and cheerful. Unfortunately, we can grow tired of this invigorating effect relatively quickly if we use it on overly large surfaces. 
We can compensate for this effect very well with paler pastel colors. Wood-effect elements, such as dark brown ship decking, look particularly good next to a bright yellow kitchen cabinet, but a terracotta floor 
or tile flooring can also make our kitchen truly cozy. Feel free to pair it with white, cream-colored, or even rust-brown accessories on larger surfaces. If you’d rather enhance the vibrant effect, 
various shades of orange offer the best solution.

Orange is one of the most popular colors for retro kitchen furniture, which is so trendy these days. Like yellow, orange has a vibrant effect, but if used on too large a surface, 
it can easily create a sense of vibrancy. We can reduce or enhance its strong effect using roughly the same colors as with yellow—that is, it can be softened with white, cream, and rust brown, 
while the effect can be intensified with yellow.

Of all the colors, red perhaps has the most distinctive physiological effect. In a room decorated primarily in shades of red and bright red, we feel much more intense, 
since these colors can cause an increase in heart rate and blood pressure. For this very reason, it’s not advisable to use these colors on large surfaces in a bedroom, because it will be much harder for us to relax, 
and we’ll have a harder time getting a good night’s sleep. However, it is precisely this effect that makes it very beneficial to use red and bright red on larger surfaces in the kitchen. Of course, we shouldn’t overdo it with these colors either. 
If that does happen, however, we can compensate very effectively with larger areas of white, dove gray, or light yellow. If we want to lend the room a touch of passion, 
this can be easily achieved with black and dark brown accessories.

The use of warm colors and color combinations is recommended primarily for rooms with a social function and a community-building role—that is, a living room or a dining room. 
Of course, if your kitchen also serves this community-building function—for example, if there are bar stools arranged around a kitchen island where you regularly entertain friends—then warm color schemes are 
highly recommended for the kitchen as well.