Running cladding in opposite directions gives a contemporary look. Many examples I've seen seem to vary the profile width each. ie. narrow verticals juxtaposed with broader horizontals. You could clad base in a recycled plastic timber-look product or composite timber cladding. (Colour stable and no maintenance). Stone could look fab too. Painting it the Farrier would definitely be simplest. You could do a contrast with the verandah floor and its edge.

Hi, interestingly I have been grappling with this issue recently! For a contemporary design I have firmly decided that dark bronze or black frames suit much better as they are visually recessive and give the optical illusion of larger glazing and help create an indoor-outdoor connection. White frames tend to focus your eyes on the frames/window rather than the space and form, however you can get these to work if you use very slender frames (which are more expensive) or if you are purposefully using traditional design cues. I know this doesn't help as you already have the DA, so if you can go with the silver pearl that is a good option, and perhaps use the words "dark beige" to darken the render!

White and cream can work together and it is a great idea to paint all your trim white to freshen and lighten your room. Whether your cream blinds look dirty if you paint the trim white will really depend on the cream tone/shade of your blinds and possibly the material they are made from. Remember the colours will look different of an evening under artificial lights than they do during the day under natural light. We have uPVC white window frames with classic cream architraves. I recently purchased some block out roller blinds and spent hours agonising over whether to match the windows or the trim so I understand your dilemma. I ended up matching the white of the windows because we wanted the blinds to 'disappear' when they are opened. Have attached a pic to show the white windows with classic cream trim fyi....

Hello jo Louise Can you please post a pic sometime today? We need to make an urgent decision re this to sign off the windows so I would love to see how it turned out. Thanks