In real rooms
Credited & tagged
All things color, in your inbox.
Paint colors worth knowing, the rooms they live in, and where color is going — in design, fashion, and beyond. Free, and only when we have something to say.
How it reads
Window Pane is a pale, silvery green so light — LRV 72 — that in a bright room it reads as a tinted white. The green is there, but it has faded almost to grey, which is what makes it so easy to live with: it cools a room without ever turning it minty.
In a dining room with a crystal chandelier and gilt it is delicate and formal; in a bedroom it is fresh and quiet. Warm light softens it toward celadon; cool light greys it. It sits beautifully beside Sea Salt, its slightly deeper sibling.
How Window Pane behaves in different light
Window Pane is a very pale blue-green with gray in it. Sherwin-Williams files it under its blue family; most reviewers who have used it see a soft green, or a seafoam with blue underneath. What they do agree on is that it is pale — Homedit notes that in bright daylight 'it looks almost white'.
In a south-facing room and warm light the green comes forward; Blacksburg Belle finds its green undertones strong, even a little teal. In a north-facing room it cools and grays, reading as an icier, more silver green, and in an entryway with indirect light the gray undertone is what you notice.
At an LRV of 72.24 it is light enough for a whole room and light enough to wash out in a very bright one. It reads as a color in shade and as a tint in sun.
Walls, trim, cabinets and ceilings
Window Pane is a wall color for the soft rooms: bedrooms, nurseries, bathrooms and laundry rooms, where its paleness is an asset. Homedit also shows it on ceilings, furniture and exterior siding.
On cabinets and doors it is less successful. Blacksburg Belle finds it 'works better on walls' than on cabinetry, because at this lightness it lacks the depth a painted cabinet needs to look intentional. Sea Salt or Rainwashed, a step or two deeper, are the usual cabinet picks in this family.
Sherwin-Williams' own coordinating colors for it are Pure White SW 7005, Extra White SW 7006 and Quietude SW 6212, and the two whites are also the trim reviewers recommend.
What it sits next to
Sherwin-Williams pairs Window Pane with Pure White SW 7005, Extra White SW 7006 and Quietude SW 6212. Natural wood, white and chrome suit it; HelpWithDIY warns it 'might clash with warm beiges or creamy yellows'.
Its family is the Sherwin-Williams coastal greens: Sea Salt SW 6204 is deeper and grayer, Rainwashed SW 6211 is deeper and more saturated, Topsail SW 6217 is bluer and stormier. Blacksburg Belle names Rain and Tradewind as other neighbors and Benjamin Moore Silver Crest as a cross-brand match.
Because it is so pale, it takes a stronger partner well — a navy vanity, a black window frame, dark wood — and looks washed out beside other pastels.
Where Window Pane fails
It fails for anyone who wanted blue. In warm light it is a green, sometimes a teal-leaning one, and the blue in it is only obvious in cool north light.
It fails in very bright, large rooms, where it washes to near-white and loses its color; HelpWithDIY suggests something with more depth for large, well-lit spaces.
And it fails beside warm beige and creamy yellow, which make its cool green look sickly. Keep the whites clean and the woods natural.
Compare
Settled, side by side
Featured inThe best green paint colors, in real rooms
Questions
Painted a room in Window Pane?
Add it to the reference library — credited to you, photographed in honest light.
Feature your project
