1Why you should love ‘boring’ hotels

hygiene protocols amid the pandemic, but many of them take place outside of a guest’s watchful eye. Always remember this tip about restaurants — you may not be able to look into the kitchen, but you can look into the bathroom and use that as a barometer of the establishment’s approach to cleanliness. White walls are cheap, easy, and don’t require creativity. But these days, they are a place one can look for stains without needing a blue light camera.

Joa Studholme, a color curator for paint and wallpaper brand Farrow and Ball, isn’t a white wall hater either. Not only does she ignore the “plain white = bad” philosophy, her first major Farrow and Ball line was a range of 20 different shades of white. Studholme stated that “White makes zero demands on you, and perhaps that’s what we need, People need to have light and spend their day in a light space.”

Although the massive upswing in people working from home during the pandemic has led to a popularity in bright colors and fun textures around the house, she points out that no matter what current trends are, her clients always ask for one room to be white — the kitchen, the place where everybody actually hangs out.

Studholme also notes that most tech objects and accessories — like that iPhone you may be reading this article on — tend to be white, giving a sleek, modern feel. Workplaces usually follow suit. “People won’t do a pink office,” says Studholme.

Admittedly white can be a cop-out color. Hotel brands buy it by the truckload, it works in just about every market, and — if you aren’t picky about exactly what quality of white to use — it’s cheap. It’s more likely to be a sad grayish-tinged white than something in an interior designer’s country house, but it generally gets the job done.