Goth Doesn’t Just Mean Black: Dark Neutrals to Embrace for 2025
By Daisy Finch
Black walls, black floors, and black doors. It’s spooky, instantly gothic and, well, convenient. But using just one colour – or shade, if you’re feeling pedantic – can start making your home a bit monotonous, instead of stylishly monochrome. If your heart’s craving a colour palette that won’t mean ditching all your favourite furniture or a quick trip to the upholsterers, these gothic neutrals will give your interior a colourful kick without any uncomfortable clashes.
(Not) Black
To ease us in, these shades are just a small step away from black, a proverbial purgatory between outright colour and a Goth’s favourite shade. Farrow & Ball are well-known for their signature blue-black shade Railings, but if you want a colour verging on violet rather than an inky blue, Bible Black once described a starless night’s sky in Dylan Thomas’ Under Milk Wood, but can now be picked up in a tin. Crown’s warm grey Printworks might seem a more obvious selection than the first two, but, as someone who rarely gets on with this in-between shade, it has a distinctive blue tone reminiscent of a graveyard at dawn that sets it apart from the crowd.
- Farrow & Ball’s Bible Black – appropriately named, Bible Black’s bruised purple is a perfect neutral
- Crown’s Printworks – this ideal grey looks shorn straight from the back of a British Shorthair and is equally as irresistible
- Farrow & Ball’s Railings – a favourite for a reason, Railings balances on the crosshairs of black, blue and green
Blood-Drenched Walls
Deep burgundy, or ‘oxblood’, is a favourite of art galleries and theatres alike for very good reason: everything you put against walls splattered in this colour will immediately look all the better for it. Plucked from the chapel in Hardwick Hall, Little Green’s Arras features in paintings depicting the life of St Paul. Likewise, Farrow & Ball’s Deep Reddish Brown has been sucked from the walls of country estates. Monarch from Dulux takes a different approach, for a fresher—I mean brighter—bloodied hue; this deep crimson is a perfect choice. Delicious!
- Farrow & Ball’s Deep Reddish Brown – does what it says on the tin: it’s a deep brown with a reddish tint. To quote Avril Lavigne, “What more can I say?”
- Dulux’s Monarch – rich crimson Monarch sits just on the right side of arrogance
- Little Greene’s Arras – trace the gothic style back to its architectural origins with Little Green’s chapel-inspired shade
Emerald Cut Shards
Green hues have long stood for evil forces, with ancient Greeks associating the colour with an excess of bile, prompting jealousy and bitterness, succeeded by Shakespeare’s green-eyed monster. But it’s also become deeply connected to nature and divinity, with Demeter, Artemis, and Hecate bringing associations of fertility and witchcraft. Ancient magic and Iago’s infamous villainy sound like the perfect basis for an interior scheme that packs a punch. Little Greene have pulled out all the stops with their deep forest green Puck and the true-emerald shades of Mid Azure Green, while Annie Sloan’s Knightsbridge Green takes us deeper into leafy greens.
- Little Greene’s Puck – forest green plucked from the pages of a Midsummer Night’s Dream
- Little Greene’s Mid Azure Green – like a witch stirred up their own take on Scheels green, this rich emerald is mouth-wateringly good
- Annie Sloan’s Knightsbridge Green – a classically dark green reminiscent of country club drawing rooms and twisted forest trees
Lost in the Woods
Brown shades are having a moment in interior design and act as a warmer alternative to the usual mid-tone grey. Little Green’s Chocolate Colour is a welcoming tone—it’s no surprise then that, according to legend, George Frideric Handel and Benjamin Franklin, both chose it as the hue for the door to their London residences. Hazelnut Truffle by Dulux is a similar feast for the eyes but offers a russet alternative that’s more hazelnut spread than raw cocoa. Farrow & Ball’s Tanner’s Brown isn’t edible but rather dedicated to the craftspeople who cured leather for use. Interestingly, the origins of ‘tanning’ come from the Medieval Latin for oak tree, an appropriate origin for this sturdy shade.
- Little Greene’s Chocolate Colour – this grey-tinged brown is a sophisticated take on chocolate, pulling more from the cocoa bean than its sweeter processed descendant
- Dulux’s Hazelnut Truffle – rich and rusted, Hazelnut Truffle’s orange undertones is a wood tone worth getting lost in
- Farrow & Ball’s Tanner’s Brown – tanned leather hides might not immediately communicate ‘luxury living’, but this almost-black shade is as timeless as the profession that inspired it
Ocean Drowning
Laura Ashley might not be a gothic go-to, but their Dusky Seaspray Blue captures the perfect tone of storms over troubled water, sitting in the intersection between a deep grey and pastel blue. Hague Blue by Farrow & Ball captures a similar spirit, but with a brighter green-toned hue. Dulux’s Sapphire Splendour, on the other hand, skips so happily across the line between navy blue and true black that it has one foot in a night-hued grave.
- Laura Ashley’s Dusky Seaspray Blue – bring the storm clouds inside for a gentle yet moody colour scheme
- Farrow & Ball’s Hague Blue – easily spotted across the Netherlands, from where it gets its name, it’s a true blue worthy of being drained straight from the North Sea
- Dulux’s Sapphire Splendour – barely there blue eases in a cooler tone to a pitch black sky
Poisoned Plum
Presumably, when the sugar plum fairy stops dancing, she goes the way of most seasonal fruit when left out on the countertop. On the bright side, you can grab a little of this glamour for yourself with deep plum shades that meet somewhere in the middle of crimson’s richness and the calm of blue seas. Dulux’s Deep Aubergine veers into the realms of whimsigoth while Annie Sloan’s Tyrian Plum makes a shade that was once the preserve of Roman emperors accessible to all. Crown’s mysteriously named Pigment No. 472 is billed as exactly that: a dark, mysterious plum. Assuming that doesn’t mean they’ve perched aviators on a stoned fruit, Pigment No. 472 is a perfect pick if you’re searching for a rich purple.
- Dulux’s Deep Aubergine – this deliciously dark violet is a match for the peeled skin of every harvest festival’s standout crop
- Annie Sloan’s Tyrian Plum – live like Caesar with a plum that was once reserved for royalty
- Crown’s Pigment No. 472 – mysterious by name, mysterious by nature, Pigment No. 472’s gentle blue-grey undertones make it a calming choice
