Stiffkey Blue

Stiffkey Blue is an inky navy, and Farrow & Ball is candid that it only reads as clearly blue in a well-lit room. Give it a south- or west-facing room with big windows and it lifts to a bright, regal navy — Sophie Pringle, quoted in Livingetc, calls it 'a beautifully inky, coastal blue with real depth, but it never feels flat'. In very strong sun one blogger warns it can even read lighter than you wanted.

In a north-facing room, or any room with one small window, the blue drains out and it heads toward black. A color reviewer at Home Like You Mean It puts it plainly: in a room with a small window opposite the sun 'you'll likely get something that reads more like a black blue color'. That can be exactly the point in a snug or a study, but it is not a color to choose for its blueness in a dim room.

It changes through the day. Pringle describes it as softer and more nuanced by daylight and almost dramatic in the evening, which is why it suits rooms that are lived in after dark.

Stiffkey Blue is a color for all four walls, and often the woodwork and ceiling too. Homes & Gardens shows it on walls, on paneling and on ceilings in a gloss finish, and designer Sophie Pringle, in Livingetc, uses it for color-drenching units in sitting rooms. It suits studies, snugs, bedrooms and powder rooms — rooms that lead off lighter spaces.

On kitchen cabinets it is one of the classic English navies, and it takes a gloss or eggshell finish well. As a single feature wall it can look unfinished; its depth is the point, and it wants to wrap a room.

Farrow & Ball specifies its Dark Tones primer and undercoat beneath it. It is heavily pigmented and hard to lighten, so if the swatch looks a shade too dark in your room, choose a different color rather than expect it to soften.

Farrow & Ball names Ammonite No. 274 as its complementary white — a soft gray-white that keeps the scheme hushed — and shows it with Cornforth White, Wevet and Mole's Breath, with Purbeck Stone, Ammonite or Off-Black on the trim. The brand positions it as the bluer, more contemporary alternative to Down Pipe.

Designers reach for other whites too. Patrick O'Donnell, the brand's ambassador, suggests a clean, complementary off-white such as Dimpse; designer Laura Stephens uses it with Wimborne White. Homes & Gardens notes that metallics, particularly aged or brushed gold, complement it beautifully.

Its nearest relative is Hague Blue, which has green in it and reads darker and moodier; Stiffkey is the cleaner, brighter navy of the two. Railings and Down Pipe are the blackened alternatives.

It fails in a small, dim, north-facing room if you wanted blue. There it collapses to a blue-black, and the inkiness that makes it beautiful in a bright room reads as gloom.

It fails as a half-measure. A single accent wall of Stiffkey Blue with white everywhere else tends to look like a decision that lost its nerve; it is far better wrapped around a whole room, woodwork included.

And it can disappoint the other way: in a very bright, sunny room some people find it reads lighter and more 'blue' than the inky swatch promised. Sample it on the darkest and the brightest wall of the room before committing.