Five pastels that hold up
in Indian light.

The one that behaves in every room.

Sage sits almost exactly between warm and cool, which is why it survives an Indian afternoon without turning acid the way a brighter green does. Against teak, cane and unbleached cotton it stops reading as a colour at all and starts behaving like a neutral.

It is the safest of the five on a full wall — including the wall behind a television, where a stronger colour competes with the screen every evening.

Pairs with — Teak or oak, unlacquered brass, off-white cotton, terracotta, cane.

Cool light, made deliberate.

Blue is the pastel most sensitive to which way your windows face. In a north-facing room it can drift cold and slightly grey; in the hard west light most Indian flats get after four o’clock it settles into something calm and faintly grand.

Use it where you want the room to feel cooler than it is — bedrooms, bathrooms, a study — and let every bit of warmth come from wood, brass and textiles rather than from the paint.

Pairs with — Warm wood, brass, white marble, indigo and ivory textiles.

The pastel people are most afraid of.

Lilac has a reputation problem: most people remember it as a colour from a child’s bedroom. The four below are far greyer than that memory — closer to a dusty mauve than to violet.

On joinery, in a powder room, or on one wall of a bedroom it reads as considered rather than sweet. It is also the only pastel here that sits happily against both cool grey stone and warm wood, which makes it unusually easy to build a room around.

Pairs with — Pale grey stone, brushed nickel or brass, cream, a deep aubergine accent.

Warmer than white, quieter than terracotta.

A blush wall does the job of an off-white without the flatness. It keeps a little colour after dark, when the ceiling lights come on — which is when most Indian living rooms are actually used, and when a cool white goes lifeless.

One warning worth taking seriously: blush pales out dramatically once it covers a whole wall. Whatever you choose off the fan deck, go one step deeper.

Pairs with — Black or deep green joinery, brass, cane, a warm white ceiling.

Borrowed daylight for a dark room.

The most genuinely useful of the five if you have one small window, or a room that opens onto a shaft. Butter yellow bounces the little light there is instead of swallowing it, and unlike a white it refuses to go grey in shade.

It is also the strongest of the five. Keep it to the smaller rooms — a kitchen, a passage, a stairwell, a study — rather than spreading it across an open living and dining area.

Pairs with — White trim, warm wood, a checkerboard floor, sage green as a companion.