Painting with Wagner + Win a Wagner Flexio 3000

I’m so excited to share my experience in visiting the Wagner Headquarters in Minnesota!  It was a blogger event that was so out of the box from the normal things that I do, and I loved every bit of it.  To make things even more fun, PPG was there too, talking about paint color trends and products, so it was like the Yin and Yang of all things that I love and work with on a regular basis.  I felt like I had arrived at the Mother Ship, and was so thrilled to be there to learn and of course, paint.  

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I have worked with Wagner products since I first started spraying, so to say that I’m a fan, is an understatement.  When I painted my cabinets (the first ones I ever did), using a Wagner conversion gun, years ago, and today I’m using a Titan Capspray HVLP commercial sprayer, that is also built by Wagner.  So, to walk into their headquarters and be greeted by this, you can see why my heart started going pitter pat.

We had the opportunity to sit down and learn more about Wagner, but got to hear from the PPG color expert, as she talked about color trends and their color of the year – Nightwatch.  It’s a rich green with some blue in it as well, and is really striking.  I’m thinking it would be sharp on a piece of furniture, a gorgeous accent wall or even a rich powder room hue.

The Rules

I’m going to chat more about PPG’s color forecast in another post, but it’s still relevant to this conversation, because we were assigned a design challenge, using some of PPG’s colors. 

• We all had a blank room to start with that was to function as a breakfast room
• We could paint the walls and the furniture, but we were limited to two colors.  We drew one color from a hat, and were assigned another color to go with it.
• We could also add white and black paint colors to the room, and could darken or lighten our assigned colors with the white or black.
• We could choose accessories from the variety of thrifted finds that were available to us.
• We had a light fixture that we could use in our space as well.
• We had about six hours to complete our challenge.
• We also had access to some fresh flowers and other new linens for our space.  (Thanks to Matthew Mead, who was also there).

The Colors

I chose my color out of the hat, and this is what I picked:

To say that I went into a state of panic, would not be an exaggeration.  The color was totally out of my comfort zone, and is not a color that I have anywhere in my home.  An interesting side note: this color was the runner up for color of the year at PPG.  Lucky for me, I wasn’t alone.  Other bloggers were equally freaked out, given colors that were way out of their normal color spectrum, but that was the whole point of this challenge, right?  When I got to my station, I saw my other color – a shade of blue.  At least blue is in my normal color sphere, so I could breathe a little easier at that point.

In going through this experience, I’ve come to the conclusion that I would probably have a full blown anxiety attack if I were on a show like “Design Star”, because it’s a lot harder to be creative under pressure than I ever imagined.  I would probably be on the floor, in the fetal position if I were on a tv show and had to do this.

Here is my space as I got started with some of the accessories that I hoarded from the thrift store options that were available.

I opted to go with the blue as my wall color, and darkened it with some black to create my own custom color.  And I used a Wagner sprayer to paint the walls.  We also had Wagner people there helping us throughout the process.  What a luxury to have helpers.  I wish I could have put them in my pocket and taken them home with me.

I decided to incorporate the Golden Field color in the way of stripes.

The Result

I also added stripes to the floor, and my table ended up being a happy accident, because I painted it three different colors (with the original intent of using a color blocking pattern on the table).   The frame got a coat of gold paint as well, and makes for a great statement piece, with the round wreath breaking up all of the lines (along with the round wood balls on the table).

Here is where you can win.  You can see the other blogger spaces by going to the Wagner website and voting on your favorite.  (You don’t have to vote for me, but if you want to that would be great).  But, by voting, you get the chance to win a Wagner Flexio 3000 paint sprayer!

I can’t say enough good things about my experience with Wagner and PPG.  Both were so welcoming and helpful, making me love them even more than I do already.  I say this because I use the products that these brands produce in my business.  All. The. Time.  So it’s even more heartening to meet some of the people behind the brand, and to like them as much as their products.  Painting with Wagner, at Wagner Headquarters, with PPG Paint, is just serendipity for me.

Jenny