Oh, that honey oak.

Something I hear often from clients.

“I really don’t like the honey oak woodwork.”

I get it. I’ve been there.

Our first home was all finished in honey oak. I had a hard time with it. The walls were brick orange and brown, colors that seemingly went well with honey oak. I swapped out the black and white picture frames for a wood finish as well. I longed for a different look.

It wasn’t until we decided to sell our home, 7 years later, that I gave the walls a facelift. I had to do a little research.

Turns out, the colors that I thought belonged with the honey oak were the colors that were making me dislike them so much to begin with.

Now I know we can’t all just go out and buy a new house every time we want a change. If you’re not up for replacing or painting your oak trim, the most budget friendly way to update your trim is to PAINT THE WALLS! Here are some things I learned from my own oak trim journey.

Honey Oak isn’t an actual type of wood. Common wood used for flooring, trim, and furniture is actually from the Northern Red Oak tree. One reason that makes it popular, is that it can be finished with a variety of stains.

Therefor, if you’re disappointed in your honey oak, it’s most likely the honey stain that you dislike. “Honey” is actually the color. It falls in the warm area on the color wheel with the yellows and the oranges.

So, you need to decide what color your trim is to determine that perfect color to paint the adjoining walls. My honey oak trim was very yellow.

Without going too in depth, I want to touch on the color wheel for just a moment. For this blog post, and for the sake of explaining the way in which I neutralized my honey oak finishes, I’m just going to touch on the warm vs cool colors on the color wheel as well as complimentary colors.

One half of the color wheel falls in to the warm category. This includes reds, oranges, and yellows. The other half falls into the cool category. This includes blues, purples, and greens.

Complimentary colors are across from each other on the color wheel. Think red and green, orange and blue, yellow and purple.

Unless you are going for one extreme or another, a home should have a balance of warm and cool colors. with honey oak being a warm color (yellow), painting the walls adjacent a warm color as well will make the honey oak even more warm and vibrant.

In order to tone down the yellow warmth of the honey oak, choose a complimentary color across from the warm colors in the color wheel.

My favorites are grays. But be careful, there are SO many gray options. Look for an undertone that is cool- a gray with a blue undertone, or a purple undertone. Steer away from the grays with a warm undertone. Warm tones will pull the yellow of the honey to the forefront while cool gray will neutralize the yellow. Here is a before and after of my first home. I fell in love with my home all over again once I painted the walls all gray! Check out my inspiration board on Pinterest to see that oak trim really can look amazing in your home!