Every so often, an interior designer captures the mood of the zeitgeist—at least, that is what happened after Robin Standefer and Stephen Alesch of Roman and Williams designed the Standard Hotel in New York's Meatpacking District. As their oft-imitated richly layered aesthetic spread, they became the go-to designers for celebrities like Kate Hudson, Davis Guggenheim, and Gwyneth Paltrow, who recently hired them for her new house in New York. This year, just in time for its 150th anniversary, the pair renovated the British Gallery at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, where it just so happened that Farrow & Ball, the paint company for color snobs everywhere, was also on the project. When Farrow & Ball began collaborating on a new paint collection with the Natural History Museum in London, they knew that Roman and Williams would be the perfect U.S. partner for its stateside debut. The collection has 16 new colors, with signature F&B names like, Skimmed Milk White, Scotch Blue, and Broccoli Brown. When T&C got the three color master-minds—Standefer, Alesch, and Farrow & Ball creative director Charlotte Cosby—in the room, we had to learn all of their tips for creating a color palette worthy of the Met (or Goop).
Farrow & Ball seems to be major museum’s go to paint color (the Museum of Modern Art, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Musee Rodin, and now the Natural History Museum in London)–why is that?
Charlotte Cosby: Our paint is a great backdrop for works of art as all our colors contain a small amount of black pigment which gives them a sophisticated look that complements the art rather than takes away from it.
How do you approach color in an interior design scheme?
Robin Standefer and Stephen Alesch: We are pretty disciplined about our color palettes; we don’t pick colors arbitrarily. When we look at a color, we decide if we like it or not. It’s a different process of waking your creativity as opposed to an instant emotional response. Our colors emerge from things that are animated such as food, flowers, and people. The colors of our spaces and decoration tend to be non-colors, colors that are hard to identify or hard to name. Some of our favorite colors in a room are 50 shades of cream, and even this can become dramatic and beautiful as the color comes alive from nature.
What advice do you have for someone experimenting with color?
Standefer and Alesch: Don’t be afraid to go dark and bold. If you aren’t ready to paint your walls, we recommend starting with a vintage piece of wood furniture and painting it.
How does Farrow & Ball create a new color palette?
Cosby: There’s no set process for researching new colors and we update our palette when it feels necessary and when we see the opportunity to add colors that will meet the needs of the modern home. Our carefully considered palette is one of our trademarks, so each color really earns its keep, offering something that no other shade on our color card does while also fitting effortlessly with the rest.
Once we have our inspiration, we then spend a great deal of time with the team in our color lab perfecting each shade. Thankfully, as we only update our palette when there’s a real need, we have plenty of time to get them just right.
Olivia Hosken is the deputy managing editor of House Beautiful, where she oversees operations across the brand's print and digital platforms. She also writes about design and architecture and was previously the style & interiors writer at Town & Country and the managing editor of Dwell.
