01
Deep brown-pink
Velvet: warm, enveloping, almost chocolate by lamplight. With a white basin, brass and a round mirror.
Help with paint Advice by room
Cloakroom and downstairs toilet: the room where you dare
The downstairs toilet is the one room in the house where colour has nothing to protect: you spend three minutes there, daylight is rare, and nobody lives in it. So it is the room for drenching — one deep colour over the walls, the ceiling, the door and the skirting, a mirror that doubles it, a warm wall light that makes it glow. A burgundy, a bottle green, a Prussian blue, a brown-pink: what you would not dare in a living room makes two unforgettable square metres here. Marble Matt Emulsion, washable, on walls and ceiling; Eggshell on the door and woodwork; one litre does it all.
Page updated September 2026 · by the Mylands France colour team
Understanding
Why a cloakroom is made for drenching
Everything that holds colour back elsewhere disappears here. Duration: three minutes, not three hours; a colour that would tire in a bedroom is a surprise every time here. Light: often no window, or a fanlight; the colour is chosen for the lamp, and by lamplight deep tones are warm, light ones are flat. Size: two square metres that white will never make big — you might as well make them beautiful. And damp: unlike the bathroom, there is no steam; every finish holds, and washable matt is perfect.
Drenching — the same colour on the walls, the ceiling, the door, the skirting, sometimes the unit and the radiator — erases the corners and the limits of a tiny room: you no longer see where the wall ends, the room becomes a volume of colour. A big mirror doubles the volume; a 2,700 K wall light brings it alive. The principle: Colour drenching; and for a cloakroom tiled to half height, a coloured ceiling does the same job from above — The cloud ceiling.
Six ideas
Six cloakrooms you don't forget
For each: the drenching colour, what makes it glow, and the cloakroom it suits. Walls and ceiling in Marble Matt Emulsion, door and woodwork in Eggshell.
02
Bottle green
The English club: deep, calm, with framed prints, a brass wall light and white tiles to half height.
03
Burgundy
The theatre: a deep red-brown that turns red by lamplight. With a gilt mirror and a chequerboard floor.
04
Prussian blue
The night: a deep blue, almost black in the corners, blue under the wall light. With white and chrome.
05
Golden ochre
Sunshine in a cupboard: a warm ochre that radiates under the lamp. For a north-facing or windowless cloakroom.
06
Warm white and a deep ceiling
The tiled cloakroom: warm white walls, ceiling and door in a deep grey-green — colour from above, without touching the tiles.
By surface
Every cloakroom surface, its finish
| Surface | Finish | Worth knowing |
|---|---|---|
| Walls | Marble Matt Emulsion | Matt, class 1 washable; two coats; no steam here, it holds without reservation |
| Ceiling | Marble Matt Emulsion, same shade | This is what makes the drench; a white ceiling cuts the room in two |
| Door, frame, skirting | Multi-Surface Eggshell, same shade | Both faces of the door if the hall allows, otherwise the inner face and the edge |
| Basin unit, shelf | Eggshell or Satin | In the shade, or one step deeper; Multi-Surface Primer on bare wood or melamine |
| Radiator, hand dryer | Eggshell | In the shade, cold; see How to paint a radiator |
| Tiles to half height | Keep them | The white of the tiles becomes the contrast; or Satin over primer to paint them away from splashes |
| Behind the basin | Satin if painted | Direct splashes; or a small run of tiles |
A litre of Marble Matt Emulsion covers a 1 × 2 m cloakroom under 2.5 m in two coats; a 100 ml sample pot is often enough for the door in Eggshell — order the shade in both finishes.
The light
A mirror, a wall light, and nothing else
A drenched cloakroom is lived in by lamplight: the lamp decides. A warm wall light, 2,700 K, at face height, either side of the mirror or above it — never a cold-white ceiling light, which makes any deep colour funereal. A big mirror, bigger than you think: it doubles the colour, throws the lamp back and turns two square metres into four. One object — a frame, a print, a shelf with three things — and that is all: a small room in a deep colour does not need furnishing, it is already full.
If the cloakroom has a window, test the colour at both hours: by day, the deep colour will be dark and calm; by night, warm and glowing. Both are intended.
To avoid
What spoils a small cloakroom
- White "to make it bigger". Two white square metres are still two square metres, dreary ones; colour makes them beautiful.
- A white ceiling over deep walls. It cuts the room and shows its height; the ceiling in the shade.
- The accent wall. One dark wall and three white ones in a room 1 m wide: a corridor. All, or nothing.
- The cold-white ceiling light. It turns burgundy brown and green black; a warm wall light.
- Satin on the walls. It shines under the wall light and shows every join; washable matt.
- Too many objects. The colour is the décor; a frame, a mirror, a shelf.
Frequently asked questions
Your questions, our answers
Doesn't a dark colour in a windowless toilet feel like a cupboard?
It is the other way round: white under a ceiling light feels like a cupboard; a deep colour under a warm wall light feels like a boudoir. The secret is the lighting — 2,700 K, at face height — and the mirror.
Should both faces of the door be painted?
The inner face and the edge in the cloakroom colour; the outer face in the hall colour, or in the cloakroom colour if you like the announcement. A door open onto a drenched room is already a picture.
Which finish, with the damp?
There is no steam in a toilet: Marble Matt Emulsion, washable, holds without reservation. Behind the basin, where water splashes, Satin in the same shade, or a small run of tiles. The detail for a bathroom: How to paint a bathroom.
Can the half-height tiles be painted?
Yes, away from direct splashes: degrease, fine sanding, Multi-Surface Primer, two coats of Satin in the wall shade — the drench becomes total. Or keep them white: they become the contrast that makes the colour sing.
How long does it all take?
A weekend: Saturday morning the washing, filling and masking, the afternoon the first coat on ceiling and walls; Sunday the second coat, the door and skirting in Eggshell. One litre, one sample pot, one wall light.
See also
Going further
Washable Marble Matt on the walls, Satin around the bath, extraction and a dry wall first. The method in eight...
The art of wrapping a whole room in a single colour — walls, woodwork and ceiling.
The nook under the stairs, the landing, the end of the corridor: seven ways to make it the place you want to b...
Hall, corridor, stairs, landing: the thread that ties the house together. A colour that welcomes, a corridor t...
“Three minutes a day in a colour you would never have dared: that is a cloakroom done right.”
