How to Change the Size of a Room With Paint

The paint colors you choose for a room can affect your mood and style. Although it will not change the actual size, it can fool your eye into seeing the space as larger, wider, or shorter.

5-Minute Crafts will show you several ways to visually change the size of a room just by using paint.

1. To enlarge your room

Expanding is considered the simplest task on our list, as it requires just one hue of paint. You can use any color of the white family. If you don’t like those hues, any pale one will be suitable.

To visually enlarge your room, you need to paint the walls, ceiling, and trim all the same pale color. Try to make the floor light as well by putting light rugs on it.

2. To make it taller

If you decide to make your room feel taller, go for 2 paint colors. One of them should be very light or white, and the second, a deep hue. All you need is to paint the ceiling a light tone and the walls a dark one.

This trick helps the space look taller since the lighter part draws attention while the dark hue comes second.

3. To narrow it

You might be thinking of making your room visually narrower if it’s too big. To reach this effect, paint one wall (a short one) and the ceiling white, while the other walls will get painted dark colors.

This way, the room feels like getting a warm hug. Your eyes will follow the white parts, and the other walls will close in on the white area.

4. To highlight a wall

The next idea is perfect for you if want to draw all attention to a piece of artwork or the furniture placement in the room. You just need to apply a focus wall technique but in reverse. Paint just one wall white or a light color, and the ceiling and other walls dark. The white side will look very bright and noticeable next to the dark ones.

5. To make the room smaller

If your room seems too light or big, just paint the ceiling and the walls using the same paint in a dark hue. This way, you will minimize the light. It works well for bedrooms and libraries where lots of light is not needed. It’s also a great solution for making a room look smaller.

6. To lengthen the space

A good solution for a short room is to paint the ceiling and one of the walls dark, while the others stay white. The white color will elongate the room, whereas the eyes will follow the long line created by the dark ones.

7. To extend the room horizontally

This can be the most difficult option to implement. You need to divide the wall into 2 parts and paint the ceiling and the bottom half of the wall white and the upper half of the wall dark. You will get a so-called sandwich effect, where the dark color between the white makes the room look wider.

8. To abridge your room

If you’d like to visually shorten your room, consider painting just one short wall dark. Make the rest of the walls and the ceiling white. This technique will help to make the dark wall look advanced, which will visually abridge the space.

9. To demote the ceiling

Make your ceiling dark and the walls white. This advice is great for tall spaces to make them look lower. Moreover, painted this way, the ceiling creates an impression of designed work.