So it is January, it is cold and a warm cup of coffee (or coco/tea of course) would sound so nice. Well, lucky for you readers of the M Carlson Blog we happen to be giving away gift cards to Starbucks for simply signing up for our quarterly newsletter. Still not confident about this commitment, just take a peek at the newsletter on our website. We have designed this newsletter for our clients in the hopes you will recieve helpful design tips, cleaning tips as well as stay connected with what is going on in the M Carlson family.

Hope to see your name on our next email blast! Until then starm warm and have a cup of Joe on us :-)

The Power of Color

The following article is an excert from the Home Owner's Resource Guide. I feel that our readers could benefit from these great tips on how just a touch of color can spice up your living environment.

To read more interesting tips on how to improve your home go to http://www.homeownersrg.com/

Painting Tips From Hirshfield's: The Power Of Color
How To Put It To Work In Your House
Whether you are redecorating or settling into a new house, never underestimate the power of COLOR to transform rooms, create moods and alter ambience. In the Twin Cities, no one knows color better than Hirshfield's. With 110 years of decorating history, this family-owned and operated business offers an unrivaled selection of paints and wallcoverings, fabrics and window fashions. And at the core of every fashion statement, design scheme or decorating plan is color. It's what breathes life into a 100-year-old farm house, multi-level townhome or spacious suburban rambler. According to the color gurus at Hirshfield's, it's not all that difficult to take advantage of the power of color in your house. But it does take a dash of daring and some basic knowledge regarding how to utilize color to your advantage.

According to Hirshfield's and The Paint Quality Institute, here are some of the ways you can tap into the power of COLOR:

Manipulate your sense of space with color.
For example, you can make a small room appear bigger with light monochromatic colors and a white ceiling. (Monochromatic colors are different tints of the same color - such as, different shades of green are monochromatic.) Light colors reflect more light (real or artificial), giving the impression that the room is open and airy.

• If you have a large overly-spacious and impersonal room, reign in the space with dark bold tones for the walls and an even darker ceiling. Consider using dark warm colors such as reds, apricots and golds. These are colors that people find comforting and intimate. • Another tactic to visually shrink a large room is to divide the wall space horizontally with a chair rail. Paint the upper and lower portions different colors. You could also add texture to the walls by using sponging or rag rolling techniques. This will help shrink the room even more.

• Do you have a low ceiling? Paint vertical stripes on the walls to visually raise the ceiling. Your stripes do not have to be sharp contrasting colors. They can be stripes of the same color but different gloss or sheen. Or, the stripes can be monochromatic. Another trick is to paint the ceiling darker than the walls. This will help to lower the ceiling. A particularly effective trick is to extend the ceiling color down the wall about 6 inches. This wide paint molding will do a great deal to visually lower the ceiling.

• Do you have a narrow hallway or a long thin room? Use color to "square it off." Paint a dark color on the narrow sides. Paint a light color on the longer walls.

• Pay attention to sun exposure. Use warmer hues (reds, golds) in a shaded and north-facing room. Use cool color tones in a sunny southern exposure.

• Give your entire house a more cohesive look by using paint colors between adjacent rooms that have some relationship.

• Painting an entire room? The more area you cover, the more intense the color will seem. If you are painting a solid wall surface, consider selecting a slightly lighter color value. But whatever you do, be sure to put some color in your decor.

©Hirshfield's, Inc. / Tam Westover, St. Paul Pioneer Press

©2006 Home Owner's Resource Guide, Inc.

Zolatone: Distinctive Finishes for your home

While patiently waiting at the Hirshfield's store to get some paint mixed for a customer Matt came across this great information sheet on Zolatone. He passed it onto myself to see if it may be of interest to our followers on Blogger. In short I felt it was of interest so here I am writing about it.

Zolatone is a leader in creative and distinctive finishes but it is also environmentally safe. For homeowners this product is great for high traffic areas, it can also be applied to tile, block and metal. So for those of us who live in older homes with pink bathroom tile, you can use this product to tranform your bathroom at a fraction of the cost.

For our readers that have commerical properties you can transform entry ways, bathroom stalls, party rooms. The possiblities are endless.

For more information and video check out the Zolatone website: http://www.zolatone.com/ or go to the information on Hirshfields website at: www.hirshfields.com/contractors/zolatone

If you are interested in seeing this production applied in an area of your home or property please give M Carlson Painting a call. We would be more than happy to assist you in this process.

Paint to Sell

While reading the Sunday morning paper we came across a great article to all of you looking to sell your home. It has shown that by neutralizing all the colors of your home before placing it on the market not only avoids a strong reaction from a potiential buyer but can help in the photographs placed on-line. Many buyers look to your on-line pictures before making futher decisions.

The article goes on to give recommendations for which colors to use. It was in Sunday's 9/20 Homes section page H4.

Changing to neutral colors can sound expensive but when using only a few neutral colors throughout the house, this can greatly decrease in paint cost and preperation time when having it done professionally. M Carlson Painting would be happy to make this a cost effective change and will offer you a 10% discount on those who mention reading this blog and are looking to do 2 color change throughout the house.

Happy Selling!

Twitter

M Carlson Painting just started Twittering. Do any of you do this? I would love feedback on how you use it either professionally or personally. We would also love to hear what your questions are for us and how our blog can be of assistance to you. Send us a quick message and we would be happy to respond!

Thanks and have a great one!

Going Green

M Carlson Painting has starting working with a great new product and are very excited about it. It is a soda cleaning machine that uses baking soda to clean those areas that in the past have been used by sand blasting or pressure washing. By using baking soda you refrain for causing damage that sand and water may cause to those troubled areas. Even better soda cleaning is able to remove the 20% of paint that pressure washing can not and even better news, it is environmentally friendly. No chemicals go washing down our drains and it uses minimal water.



We are very excited about this, please feel free to call us at 952-933-9968 with more inquires about this product.