Hi plankandtrestle The undertones are tough to pick until it's in the flesh! Monument could be a good contender... if you want a true charcoal you could ask the paint counter to use only pure black and white to get your desired charcoal... I have monument on my gutters, downpipes and trim see below. I've paired it with wallaby which is a brown grey (you could darken) Hope this helps K x

I agree with ctwalker, if you paint the inside of your front door white it will blend with the inside of your house especially as the door is in your lounge. On the outside a stain will look great and if you keep a path going to your front door people won't have trouble wondering where to go. All the work your doing looks fantastic keep up the good work :)

No single chairs (yet). The blue lounges are 100cm deep by approx 198cm long. I did place them adjacent one another to see if I could have that configuration but the one against the external wall extended past the door opening and it just didn't look right. So I presumed a cnr sofa with the short side against the external wall or sofa with chaise would probably be the best option. It is possible that I could get a 2 seater but would have the challenge to make sure it complemented the three seater rather than clash. There appears to be more choices for rhf sofas than lhf.

I look at the first picture , and the most noticeable thing ( in a good way ) is the letterbox -- its an offwhite by the looks of it . So I'd do all the trim in that , and it even works with the roof ( sort of ) . The garage door is okay as it is -- the lighter tones elsewhere will balance that IMO . Ideally , I'd look at changing the garage door to a cedar timber at some stage -- again that would work with the roof , bricks , trim , etc . Probably just me , but I'm with you about going darker -- it may look 'dingy' , but none of them seem a fit with the roof IMO . Even something like surfmist ( off-white with a slight blue tinge ) doesn't gel in my mind . If you had the budget , and did want to look more modern , THEN maybe go a charcoal like monument , BUT with the cedar ( or cedar stained ) garage door , and 15 or so 40x40 battens , again cedar stained , basically the length of the 3 right side poles , so there's still that 2 metres or so in the middle that is 'open' . The cedar door on the left , and battens on the right , will visually look reasonably balanced and modern , without being too symetrical . The downside is it will cut down the light a bit , so depends if thats worth more than looking modern .