Brick House Colors
Brick is the one exterior color you didn't choose and mostly can't change. So every scheme that works starts the same way: read the brick you have, then pick trim, door, and shutters that agree with it. This page does both — and lets you preview all of it on your own house.
TRY IT ON MY HOUSE — FREETry "paint the trim Alabaster and the door black" · The brick stays untouched unless you ask · Free previews every day
Read the Brick Before You Buy Anything
Start with the mortar, not the brick. Mortar is the cheapest clue on the facade: gray mortar means the house already carries a cool neutral, and grayed whites and greiges will slot in without a fight. Cream or buff mortar means the house was built around warmth — warm whites and creams will look original there, and a stark blue-white will look like a replacement part. A trim color close to the mortar almost never fails.
Then find the undertone. Hold a sheet of pure white paper flat against the brick in daylight. Against true white, the cast shows itself in seconds: most "red" brick turns out orange-red, some leans purple or maroon, and older brick reads brown with tan and charcoal flecks. Orange-red brick wants warm trim or true black. Purple-red can carry a cooler greige. You can't see any of this from the driveway; you can see it in one minute with paper.
Last, know which decisions reverse. Trim, door, and shutters repaint in a weekend. The brick itself does not: paint films over masonry and changes how the wall breathes, stripping it is brutal and never complete, and that wall needs repainting forever after. It's a one-way door. Preview it, sleep on it, then decide.
Trim Colors for Red Brick
Get the trim right and the house looks intentional instead of inherited. Guess, and the brick punishes you — its undertones are strong enough to turn the wrong white yellow and the wrong gray blue. Every color below is a real, buyable paint color with its code, and every swatch links straight into the visualizer so you can test it on your own photo first.
Trim is where brick-house repaints are won or lost. Red brick is warm; most modern "designer" whites are cold. Put a blue-white next to orange-red brick and the brick looks dirty while the trim looks plastic. The fix is simple: stay on the warm side of white, or skip white entirely and go dark. The same rule sorts the grays: a warm greige like Benjamin Moore Revere Pewter (HC-172) bridges to red brick naturally, while a cold blue-gray is the one that fights it. These six cover the range — the notes say which brick each one suits.
SW 7008
Alabaster (SW 7008)
The safest warm white on the market — soft enough not to glare against orange-red brick, clean enough to still read as white from the street.
BM OC-17
White Dove (BM OC-17)
A touch softer and slightly grayer than Alabaster, which makes it the better warm white when your brick leans brown or has gray mortar.
SW 7012
Creamy (SW 7012)
A true cream with a yellow base — it flatters orange-toned brick the way original 1950s trim did, without looking dingy.
BM OC-95
Navajo White (BM OC-95)
The deepest cream here; it warms up brown and tan-flecked brick and hides brick dust and weather far better than a bright white.
SW 7036
Accessible Beige (SW 7036)
A greige for people who find white trim too stark — its gray side calms purple-red and cooler brick instead of fighting it.
SW 7069
Iron Ore (SW 7069)
The modern move: near-black trim makes red brick look richer and more current, and it works on every brick undertone because it argues with none of them.
One trade habit worth stealing: brush a two-foot patch of the trim color on a board and hold it against the brick on the shady side of the house, then the sunny side. Brick shifts between sun and shade more than almost any siding material. Or skip the board and flip through all six on a photo of your house in a minute.
Door and Shutter Accents
With the trim settled, the door and shutters carry the personality. They are small areas, which makes them the cheapest thing on a brick house to get boldly right. Black front doors are the perennial winner against red brick; deep greens and navy run close behind — their coolness plays off the warm masonry. We rank the full field, with previews, on the front door color page.
Shutters follow the same logic but reward restraint. On brick they look best in one deep color repeated exactly — never a second accent. Shutter colors for red brick are a big enough question that they get their own page in the shutters guide, including the black-versus-green decision and what to do when the shutters are vinyl.
Painting the Brick Itself
Sometimes no trim color rescues the brick: additions in mismatched brick, heavy patching, a purple-red you have hated for a decade. Painting brick works, and painted-brick houses sell well right now. Go in clear-eyed anyway. It is effectively permanent — stripping paint off masonry is brutal and rarely complete. The surface needs repainting roughly every ten to fifteen years. And a film of paint changes how the wall handles moisture; on old, soft brick, trapped moisture can spall the faces off in freeze-thaw climates. Have someone who knows masonry look first. And preview before anything: the visualizer keeps the texture and mortar lines, so a painted-brick test looks like painted brick, not a flat overlay.
The middle path is limewash: a mineral coating that penetrates the brick instead of filming over it, so the wall keeps breathing. It weathers by softly eroding — some people love the aged, mottled look, and you can even wash portions back off in the first day or two for a distressed finish. Paint gives you a uniform, modern surface. Limewash gives you texture and forgiveness. For most whole-house whites, these are the colors that actually work at that scale:
SW 7042
Shoji White (SW 7042)
The painted-brick favorite — warm and slightly muted, so a whole wall of it never turns glaring in full sun.
SW 7551
Greek Villa (SW 7551)
Brighter than Shoji White but still warm; the pick when you want the crisp "white brick farmhouse" look.
BM OC-45
Swiss Coffee (BM OC-45)
A classic cream-white that keeps painted brick looking established rather than freshly flipped.
BEHR DC-003
Blank Canvas (BEHR DC-003)
Behr’s warm designer white — a budget-friendly equivalent if the masonry paint is coming from the big-box store.
Three Complete Brick House Schemes
If you want a finished answer instead of a parts list, start here. Each of these three is a proven combination, and each links into the visualizer — so you see it on your own house, not someone else's Pinterest photo.
Classic Red Brick + Cream Trim + Black Door
The scheme that never dates: keep the brick, warm the trim to a cream instead of a stark white, and anchor the entry with a true black door.
keep as is
SW 7012
SW 6258
Red Brick + Sage Accents
Sage green sits opposite red on the color wheel, so it calms brick instead of competing with it — use it on gables, siding sections, or shutters with a soft white trim.
keep as is
SW 6178
BM OC-17
SW 9130
Painted White Brick + Black Accents
The full transformation: warm white over the brick, matching trim so nothing outlines, and black on the door, gutters, and light fixtures for contrast.
SW 7042
SW 7551
SW 7069
SW 6258
More Colors That Love Red Brick
Eight more proven brick companions — crisp and creamy whites, calm greiges, and the deep greens and near-blacks that make red masonry look expensive; tap any swatch to preview it on your house.
Brick runs through most traditional American house types. If yours is a specific style, the style guide narrows things further — the ranch guide covers the long low brick ranch, and the craftsman guide handles brick-and-shingle combinations. The rest of the lineup is on the house styles index.
See It on Your Brick.
One photo of your house, every trim, door, and painted-brick idea on this page — free while in beta, right in the browser on any phone or computer.
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