Zoom Consultations for Your House

We offer intensive Zoom consultations for Exterior House Colors, Restorations, New House Plans Review, and Make-overs to qualified homeowners.

Please carefully read this page before completing the form at the bottom of the page to request a consultation. Understanding the information in the links will save time and cost to you during a zoom call.

Homeowners Beware: Can You Trust Your Contractor?

Your contractor may possess skills and passion for old homes, but that does not automatically guarantee they have the expertise or qualifications. Traditional architecture is something today’s architects are no longer taught unless they are specialized in historic preservation. See my credentials here.

There is a video out there about Spring Break called Girls Gone Wild. Someday I will make a similar video called, “Contractors, Architects, and Homeowners Gone Wild”

Just because a homeowner spends a lot of money on a project and does a lot of work doesn’t mean what they did was right or that the house will look good.

Homeowners are immune to the abundance of bad design everywhere including that of their own home. They try to fix their home by buying and buying: New light fixtures, new door color, new landscaping etc. They don’t realize these are merely distractions from the fundamental problem they and their contractors have created.

They finally convince themselves their house looks good. Ignorant neighbors will joyfully compliment them too. Unfortunately this only looks good to the UNTRAINED eye.  Just because 100 people on Houzz say something look great does not mean that it is. They are merely educating themselves by constantly looking at bad design. My goal is to train your eyes to not only see the difference but to understand why.

The following is an excerpt by Steve Mouzon’ book  that explains what people do to their old and new homes.

. . . historic homes consist of misshapen pieces of modern or Disneyland interpreted traditional architecture stitched together with no clear vision of what the result should be. The same is for current construction stitched together with semi-traditional pieces or architecture.

Most people probably can’t explain exactly what is wrong with this sort of building because there are just enough traditional pieces thrown in to make it look vaguely traditional at first glance just as Frankenstein looked vaguely human at first.

It is important to maintain your house correctly. You are merely a steward of many homeowners. Remember, future homeowners will scrutinize the work done on your house. Understanding architectural design and old house restoration services is the key to ensuring a successful outcome.

WINDOWS: If you are unfortunate enough to have purchased a house from rabid homeowners that replaced your original windows with white plastic, your house is considered damaged. Your option is to paint according to this link or have replica windows made. If YOU replaced your windows with such then you have no place here for future homeowners will curse your grave.

Avoid Paint Color Placement Mistakes

As you probably know by now, choosing exterior historic paint colors for your house is not easy.

Most important! The appearance of good paint colors for your house means NOTHING unless there is good COLOR PLACEMENT  . I can’t stress this enough!

There are certain structural features on a house which need to be displayed correctly to give your home the appearance it was designed to have. To accomplish this, the paint colors you choose must be placed on your house in the right locations to work together with the form and structure of the building.

This is where most people fail when having their house painted. Seriously 95 percent of houses have color placement wrong. See the comparisons in my portfolio  . They may have chosen the most beautiful exterior house color schemes that work very well together, but if placement of these colors on the house do not follow the architectural form of the building, it will make it look off balance. Beauty is NOT in the eyes of the beholder but shapes in architecture such as rectangular windows. These shapes are what affects our inner senses and the correct color placement allows these shapes to be recognized and enjoyed.  Curb appeal info.   (I plan to write a book on this for there is a lot of important information.)

Professional Color Consultants & Decorators

I have seen the work of many professional color consultants and decorators. The colors are really nice but there are way too many colors as if to impress, and those color are in the wrong places. This color pro is a decorator are rarely has training in architecture. The result is an 8 color Victorian circus house with beautiful colors.

Most architectural errors are realized by our subconscious mind, but few of us have the time to really notice any disharmony.

Our Virtual: Paint Color, Restoration, Curb Appeal, & New House Plans, Consulting Service

We offer our services to qualified homeowners. This service is EXCLUSIVELY for homeowners and business owners that demonstrate pride in ownership and a respect for historic architecture (providing your home is historic).

We promise to teach you and guide you to make your house look like the best house on the block. We will also review your new construction elevation drawings before you finalize them.

If your house does not currently have the ability for the best curb appeal we must decline your project but will happily explain what needs to be done.

FIRST – If you have not already, please review my portfolio page. You will notice that the renderings are of the full front of the house. I no longer offer that service. Don’t worry, that is good.

A full front rendering (that was suitable for framing) would take me several hours of setup with a cost to you of $500-800 depending on the house. The current hourly rate is considerably less costly.

The difference with the new service is that we will render only a portion of your house showing you various colors on your monitor instead of through email. This way I explain what to do and why so you understand the logic behind it all. This is a very intense consult therefore it is recorded for you to replay at home.

This works better for us both. Once setup is done I will show you various color combinations you like. I will always provide suggestions and my honest opinion.

What to expect during a Zoom consultation

Rates are $160 an hour.
(usually 1 hour is enough but additional time is charged in 15 minute increments. I will invoice you after for payment by check or PayPal.)

 I am respectful of the time and your cost so I will send links to my custom made color charts and about 30 pages of information in advance that will answer a lot of your questions. This includes links to archived paint brochures. It would be good to review the website before also.

I will need a good quality photo. Please see instructions below.

The meeting will begin with a critique and then for the next 20 minutes (if our meeting is about paint colors) or so depending on the details of the house I will be correcting the color placement errors and then outlining each feature before I can show you colors on your house.

Due to time limits I will focus only on a small section of the house where you can get the best idea of how the color will appear together.  I work fast but keep in mind that the more color placement correction and the more details that need to be outlined, will take up more time. Adding shutters , curtains, architectural changes too.

If your paint is peeling or dirty in the photo, this will alter how the paint color appears . I can graphically install new siding and do some fixes if needed but it will take more time. If your siding is natural or stained wood, I would need to do the same.

I will always provide suggestions and my honest opinion. At the end I will send you a video of our meeting.

Dirty siding – Dirty siding painted – Dirty siding graphically resided and painted.

Learn About Color Placement & Do it Yourself

Try doing it on your own. There is only one book I can recommend. Victorian Exterior Decoration by Roger Moss.   I recommend trying this as a first step before contacting me. This way I will have more time to write a book on Paint Color Placement.

Complete the form at the bottom of the page to get started.