I’ve had a lot of kitchens in my time. Occupational hazard. There was the high-gloss white laminate moment (forgive me, it was the late 90s and we were all making questionable choices), a very chic French Gray phase, and a couple of timber kitchens that basically gave golden retriever energy: warm, reliable, impossible to hate. So, when we renovated again in 2022, I decided to swerve my usual ‘safe but smug’ palette and go for something with a bit more bite. Enter: Obsidian Green by Little Greene.
It’s one of those almost-black shades that looks inky and moody one minute, then green and velvety the next. Very fashion. Very grown-up. Very “I’ve got my life together,” or at least that’s the impression I’d like to give. To stop it tipping into full goth kitchen territory, I followed my lovely designer friend Irene Gunter’s advice and kept the darker color below eye level, with the tall cabinetry in Portland Stone Pale. “Depending on the light levels, I would generally recommend opting for darker shades on the base cabinets and lighter above, particularly if the ceilings are low,” she says, explaining this helps draw the eye upward and keeps the space feeling brighter and more open.
