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How it reads
Maritime White is a warm, creamy off-white with a green-grey base that stops it from tipping into yellow. At LRV 72 it is soft rather than bright — an ivory, not a white — and in a bedroom it makes everything feel calmer and slightly older, in the best way.
It flatters greens of every kind: a chartreuse painting, olive linens, a sage chair. In warm light it glows; in cool light it stays neutral instead of going grey, which is rarer than it sounds for a cream.
How Maritime White behaves in different light
Benjamin Moore calls Maritime White 'a sophisticated off-white with muted beige tones', and The Color Concierge, which has used it, is more specific: it is 'closer to a light beige' than a white, with 'warm pinkish-apricot undertones' rather than yellow ones, and in very warm lighting it 'could look a bit pink or orange on the wall'. It is not a yellow cream.
Those undertones are why it holds up in rooms short on light. The Color Concierge says it has 'enough pigment to not look washed out or cold', and shows it in a small room with no windows that 'still looks bright and lovely' because of the warmth in the walls.
In very warm light the same undertones can go too far. The Color Concierge warns that under warm lighting 'it's possible that Maritime White could look a bit pink or orange on the wall'. Its LRV of 71.6 means it has enough pigment that, in The Color Concierge's words, it 'won't look white on the wall'.
Walls, trim, cabinets and ceilings
Maritime White is a wall and cabinet color, not a trim color. The Color Concierge says it is 'really not light enough to use as an interior trim and ceiling white', but recommends it for kitchen cabinets 'as an alternative to traditional white kitchen cabinets', and calls it 'a great bathroom paint color' for the walls.
On walls it reads as a light, warm beige that is softer than a true beige and more colorful than an off-white. It pairs best with a cleaner white on the trim.
Outdoors it works on stucco and siding, but The Color Concierge cautions that its undertones 'may look too pink in the bright sun' to use as an exterior trim white.
What it sits next to
Benjamin Moore's coordinating colors for Maritime White are Cloud White 967, Simply White OC-117, Broken Arrow 1026 and Palladian Blue HC-144. For trim, The Color Concierge suggests Chantilly Lace OC-65, Cloud White or White Dove OC-17, and warns off Simply White — it 'has too much yellow in it' — even though Benjamin Moore lists it as a coordinating color. If you need a Sherwin-Williams match for the wall color itself, The Color Concierge points to Divine White.
Muted, earthy blues and blue-greens flatter it. Yellows, mustards and yellow-leaning greens do not — The Color Concierge says it 'doesn't look good' with them, because 'the undertones clash with Maritime's pinkish-apricot undertones' — and the same goes for cream: 'In general, I recommend staying away from cream colors that are very yellow.' It also needs a trim with real contrast; a darker white 'won't provide enough contrast'.
Its relatives are Ballet White OC-9, Sherwin-Williams Aesthetic White SW 7035, Divine White SW 6105 and Accessible Beige SW 7036, and Benjamin Moore Muslin OC-12. Benjamin Moore lists Fossil AF-65, Feather Down 953, Muskoka Trail 974 and Olympic Mountains 971 as similar.
Where Maritime White fails
It fails as a trim or ceiling white. It is too deep and too colored; against it, a real white looks white and Maritime White looks beige.
It fails in very warm light, where the orange and pink in it come forward and the wall can read peachy. Sample it under the bulbs you will live with.
And it fails beside cream and beside yellow. Cream trim makes it look dirty, and yellow-based colors fight its orange-pink base.
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