Choosing a Sherwin-Williams white for your exterior body and trim

Pick a Sherwin-Williams exterior white by your fixed materials and your light, not the chip. Pure White SW 7005 is the versatile middle ground, Extra White SW 7006 is the crisp trim choice, Alabaster SW 7008 and Greek Villa SW 7551 add warmth, Creamy SW 7012 reads as true cream, and Shoji White SW 7042 leans greige.

The longer answer involves your roof, brick, window frames and which way the house faces, because a white never sits on a house alone. At Guiffre’s Painting Co. we paint with Sherwin-Williams, and these six whites cover nearly every exterior look. One rule first: screens and paint chips mislead, so every choice here ends with a large sample on your own house.

How do the six whites compare?

Here’s how they line up, roughly from crispest to warmest and deepest.

Extra White SW 7006 is the brightest of the group and leans slightly cool, which is why it’s a favorite for trim. Around windows and against a dark body, it draws a clean, sharp line. As a whole-house body color in full sun, it can tip into glare.

Pure White SW 7005 is soft and clean with a touch of warmth. It works as a body color, a trim color or both, and it rarely fights with roofs, stone or brick. If you don’t know where to start, start here.

Greek Villa SW 7551 and Alabaster SW 7008 are the warm whites. Greek Villa is gently creamy; Alabaster, Sherwin-Williams’ 2016 Color of the Year, is a creamier off-white. Both soften a house and sit comfortably beside red brick and warm stone.

Creamy SW 7012 is a true cream with visible yellow warmth. Choose it when you want the house to read as cream rather than white. With Rookwood Dark Green SW 2816 shutters on a traditional home, that can be exactly right.

Shoji White SW 7042 is a soft off-white with a greige cast, deeper than Alabaster. That depth helps in strong sun, where lighter whites wash out, and its gray-beige cast can bridge materials that mix the two.

Should you choose a warm or a cool white?

Start with what you can’t change: the roof, brick, stone, windows, and any walk or driveway you’re keeping. Then choose a white that shares their temperature.

• Warm materials such as red or orange brick, tan stone, brown shingles and cedar favor warm whites: Greek Villa, Alabaster or Creamy.
• Cool materials such as gray or charcoal shingles, gray stone and bright white vinyl favor cleaner whites: Pure White or Extra White.
• Mixed materials, like a gray roof over tan stone, call for a white in between: Pure White, or Shoji White for something softer.

Style plays a part too. Cleaner whites tend to look tailored on a post-war Colonial or a ranch, while warmer whites flatter older homes with aged brick and original wood trim. Our guide to choosing exterior colors for a classic home works through body, trim and accents together, and our Color Studio has more on building a scheme.

Why does white look brighter on the house than on the chip?

Daylight outdoors is far stronger than the light in a kitchen or a paint store. Full sun washes color out, so nearly every white looks lighter, brighter and starker on a sunny wall than it did on the chip.

The fix is to go a step softer or deeper than your first instinct. If Extra White looks right on the chip, try Pure White on the house. If Pure White looks right, test it beside Alabaster or Shoji White. The softer white often turns out to be the color you pictured.

Shade does the opposite. Under a deep porch roof, beneath eaves and on overcast days, whites drift grayer and flatter, so judge your choice in shade as well as sun.

Does it matter which way your house faces?

Yes. In Michigan, as anywhere in the Northern Hemisphere, south-facing walls get the most direct sun, and north-facing walls sit in cooler, indirect light.

• South-facing walls wash whites out the most. Bright whites can glare there, so Pure White or the deeper Shoji White often holds up better than Extra White.
• West-facing walls catch warm late-afternoon light, which exaggerates warm whites. Creamy and Alabaster can drift toward yellow, so sample them there first.
• North-facing walls cool everything down. Crisp whites can look gray or flat, and a warmer white such as Greek Villa or Alabaster usually reads more like “white.”
• East-facing walls are bright in the morning and shaded by afternoon, so check samples at both times.

Judge the white on the wall people see most, usually the front, then check the shadiest side.

Which white goes with brick, stone, a gray roof or white vinyl windows?

Red brick

Red and orange brick are warm, so warm whites look natural beside them: Greek Villa or Alabaster, or Creamy for a more traditional cream. A stark, cool white can look harsh against old brick. On the brick Colonial Revival and Georgian homes found across Grosse Pointe, white or cream trim is the traditional pairing.

Stone

Take your cue from the stone itself, and hold chips against its lightest tones. Tan and buff stone favors Alabaster or Greek Villa. Gray stone favors Pure White. Stone that mixes gray and beige is where Shoji White’s greige cast earns its place.

Gray and black roofs

Gray and charcoal shingles pair cleanly with Pure White and Extra White, while very creamy whites can look yellow beneath them, so test Creamy and Alabaster against the roof before committing. Black roofs suit almost any white, and brown shingles favor the warm ones.

White vinyl windows

Factory-white vinyl windows are a white you work around, and white beside white is where mismatches show most. Creamy trim against a bright vinyl frame can look yellow. Pure White or Extra White usually sits more comfortably beside vinyl, but factory whites vary, so hold trim samples against the actual frame.

How do you pair white with shutters, a front door or a dark body?

A white body with black or navy shutters

Dark shutters frame every window on a white house. With Extra White or Pure White, Tricorn Black SW 6258, a true neutral black, gives the sharpest, most formal contrast. With warmer whites such as Alabaster or Greek Villa, Iron Ore SW 7069, a soft black, keeps the contrast strong without feeling harsh. Naval SW 6244, a deep navy and Sherwin-Williams’ 2020 Color of the Year, works with all six.

The front door is where a white house can take a bold color. Positive Red SW 6871 is bright and saturated, Rookwood Red SW 2802 is a deep historic oxblood that suits older homes, and Rookwood Dark Green SW 2816 is a traditional dark green. Our shutter color guide and front door guide go further.

White trim on a deep body

Flip the scheme and white becomes the accent. On a Naval body, Extra White trim draws a crisp, nautical outline, and Pure White softens it slightly. On an Iron Ore body the contrast is already strong, so Pure White or the warmer Alabaster can look more relaxed than Extra White.

Dark colors absorb more heat in the sun, so on vinyl siding, confirm that the paint and color are rated for vinyl before going dark. Our guide to navy exterior paint colors covers blue bodies in more depth.

How should you test exterior white samples?

Never choose an exterior white from a chip or a screen. Monitors and phones shift color, and a small chip held indoors says little about a sunlit wall.

1. Go big. Paint two coats onto sample boards about two feet square, or larger.
2. Test on the house. Prop the boards against the siding, beside the trim, brick, stone and windows they’ll live with.
3. Use more than one side. Put one set on the sunniest wall and another on the shadiest.
4. Look at different times and distances. Check morning, midday, late afternoon and an overcast day, from the street as well as up close.
5. Compare in pairs. Differences that are invisible alone become obvious side by side. A sheet of plain printer paper beside them shows which lean warmer or cooler.

Give yourself time. Michigan’s exterior season runs roughly from late spring to early fall, so settle on a white well before your exterior painting is on the calendar.

Questions

Try these colors on a houseSketch body, trim, shutter and door colors in real Sherwin-Williams colors.→