Can we talk about the white house?
Not THE White House, because I don’t have enough words for the fustercluck that is going on over there, but white houses generally.
Have you noticed how they’ve taken over our neighbourhoods almost by stealth. A few years ago you’d see one or two peeking between the old federation shades of burgundy, butter and green but now Australia has become the southern hemisphere’s Santorini (minus the blue doors as sage or natural timber appears to be our entryway shade of choice).
Apologies to Dulux but it’s White on White on White on White. Walk down my street and they’re like teeth, gleaming side-by-side, as if urban planning has been hijacked by dentistry and only the shiniest and most sterile will do. I mean they do look lovely – an improvement on the sewage-hued brown brick that populated so many of our suburbs in the last century – but have we reached peak white? Has white supremacy gone too far?
First, a disclaimer. My house is white. Snowy Mountains Quarter to be exact, which is a little cooler than Natural White but not the full ice gleam of Lexicon. If you’re a WHP (white house person), you’ll know what I’m talking about and, if you’re not, well, you can nod along happily knowing you have not wasted days of your precious life choosing a shade of a colour which some might argue is not even a colour.
Now, I love my house and I love all the other white houses but this week Facebook threw up a memory of my visit to Newfoundland in Canada, where the houses are painted in jellybean shades of yellow, pink, aqua and lilac. These little houses unfurl down hills like a sherbet necklace instantly making your heart smile. It’s the same in London’s Notting Hill – rows of pastel terraced homes in shades of lavender, coconut ice and eau de nil.
Look, I know from speaking to locals that these pretty streets with their paintbox visages are not all borrowed cups of sugar and harmony, not least because if you choose to paint your house daffodil and your neighbour jumps in before you with lemon curd, then the scheme is buggered. But, for the rest of us, it’s very helpful to be told: “Yes, pop in, we’re the melon one, between the forget-me-not blue on the right and the candyfloss on the left.” In my street, you’d be saying: “It’s number 12, not to be confused with 10, 14 and 16 which all look the same.”
To be fair (as opposed to dark which, frankly, would be very welcome – perhaps a French navy?), it’s not just happening here. Last month the New York Times declared that the “modern farmhouse” with its neutral colour palette, Adirondack chairs and “shiplap” – or what we call VJ boards in Australia – is the millennial answer to the Baby Boomers’ McMansions. Clearly it’s a global issue which is why we have house upon house that look like the Hamptons have had a baby with Ikea. Lovely and calm to look at but a tad boring?
You have to feel sorry for those caught up in this whitewashing. Imagine Min, the guy who painted my house, going home to his wife in the evening and discussing his day.
Mrs Min: “So what colour was it today darling?”
Min: “Cotton Sheets today, sweetheart, but next week I’ve got a client deciding between Caspar White and Milk Cloud, so that should switch things up a bit.” The poor bloke would doubtless fall of his ladder in excitement if, say, a client chose Porter’s Chilli Coral.
I also pity the paint manufacturers who have surely run out of words to describe white, particularly those shades that throw blue or yellow (do not get so transfixed by white paint that you know what this means). Having exhausted all options that sound faintly appealing – Talc, Alpen, China Doll, Gardenia, Coconut Milk, Snow Goose – they must amuse themselves with the less alluring alternatives. Perhaps a shade called Dentures or Tampon, or a yellow under-toned Conjunctivitis?
Of course, we could blame home renovation shows such as The Block or design dynamos Three Birds Renovations, whose online chat groups discuss shades of white with the sort of enthusiasm normally reserved for multiple orgasms. Or we could accept that we are rapidly becoming the Cyclades of the Pacific and that any day now – Qantas prices permitting – tourists may flock here to see our bright, white enclaves that work so well with tropical, native and succulent landscaping. After all, climate change is clearly going to give us Grecian summer temperatures year-round so what better shade to reflect the dazzling light and keep our homes heat resistant.
I daresay when my house needs repainting in a decade or so I’ll jump off the white bandwagon – Murobond’s Whaler and Surf Shack are appealing shades of blue – but, in the meantime, I’ve discovered how to be both pale and interesting. Get beyond my front door and it’s colour galore.
ANGELA LOVES
Cleaning hack
Make your old sneakers gleam with this hack my daughter taught me. Remove laces and soak them in bleach, scrub shoes with Gumption, then rinse. Next, spray the uppers with stain remover and leave for 30 minutes before popping in the washing machine. There’s new life in those old kicks.
Australian Story
Watch the recent episode with Alone Australia winner Gina Chick to be inspired by how nature is the ultimate healer.
AFLW
On the back of the huge interest in the Matildas, I’ve been looking forward to the beginning of the women’s AFL matches which started this weekend.
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Originally published as Mollard: How did our streets get taken over by white supremacists?