If there’s a room in your home that you’re itching to give a new paint color, there are a few things that you’re going to want to think about before you head off to the hardware store and buy a new can of paint or book professional painters to come paint the room for you.

To help make sure that the color you pick will really suit you and the space, here are three things to think about before choosing a new paint color for a room.

Consider The Mood You Want

One of the first things that you should think about when choosing a color for a room is the mood that you want people to feel when they’re in that space. Different rooms will want to bring about different emotions, so choosing a paint color that will bring about the exact mood that you want is important.

To know which colors might turn the room into the mood that you want, you may want to consider learning a bit about color theory. In a general sense, lighter colors are going to be associated with lighter feelings, while darker colors are going to be associated with darker feelings. Bright colors tend to leave people feeling more cheerful while richer tones make a space feel more moody and serious.

Know The Undertones You’re Working With

Once you’ve decided on the mood that you want your room to have, you then need to choose a color that will help make that mood apparent. But regardless of the color that you choose, every color is going to have some kind of undertone. And once you understand that undertone, you can better understand the color that you choose and how it will work in your space.

If you’re having a hard time determining what the undertone of a color is, try holding a piece of paper of that color up to it. This works particularly well with white, as holding a starkly white piece of paper up to the paint color will help you see what color the undertone is when compared to the clean white.

Think About The Lighting In The Space

The lighting of a room can also make a difference in how a color will look on the walls of the room.

To help you determine if the lighting of your specific room is going to complement the color that you want to paint the space, try painting a swatch on the wall that you scrutinize under all kinds of different light, be it natural light and artificial lights. If you think it looks bad in one of the lights you use, you might want to try a new color.

If you’re going to be choosing a new paint color for a room in your home, consider using the tips mentioned above to help you pick the perfect one.