I’ve been obsessed with white homes for some time now, as I mentioned here, and I feel like it’s a timeless look, so the classic exterior color of our new home (dubbed The Creek Classic) was a very each choice. White all the way, baby! Multiple people tried to talk me into black windows, and while I can definitely appreciate the contrast of black against white, it feels a little too trendy and farmhouse for the overall timeless coastal look I’m trying to create. I really don’t want to look back in five or ten years and go, “Our house feels so 2019!” Know what I mean?! So we are sticking with white everything. Except the roof, of course. That would just be weird. For the record, the roof will be black.

In aiming for a classic exterior, I would have loved to build a Colonial style home, but Adam and I have pretty opposite tastes, and to put it nicely, Colonials aren’t his favorite. The style we’ve settled on falls somewhere in between a modern shingle style and a craftsman with coastal leanings. A shingle style home has a bit of an East Coast Hampton-esque feel, which I love. I have eclectic tastes, but anything that feels beachy (East Coast, West Coast, tropics, Florida, I don’t care!!!) is OK in my book. A craftsman is a bit more Adam’s style, so we’re meeting in the middle.

A few weeks ago, I shared our floor plan, but the elevation included in that post was not our final elevation. Our builder, Precision Homes, uses LP Smartside on the front of their homes, and we hadn’t yet decided if we were going to do a combination of lap siding (thick horizontal wood look siding) and shingles, or shingles alone. The original elevation showed a combination, plus the stone required by our city. Board and batten (vertical alternating wide boards and narrow wooden strips, called battens) was also an option, but we quickly ruled that out, as it has more of a farmhouse or craftsman feel to me.

Most people tried to talk me into going with a combination, but I kept seeing these gorgeous homes with all white shingles, and when I pictured our house, that’s the vision I had.

I especially loved this classic exterior on the beautiful home Jillian Harris’ and her husband completely remodeled. Seriously, how GORGEOUS is this porch?!

I knew if I went any other route, I’d regret it down the road. The decisions I let other people talk me into tend to be the ones I regret the most, especially from a design perspective. At least that was true in our last house!

So white shingles it is! The back and sides of the home will be white maintenance free vinyl siding… I’d love to do shingles all the way around, but don’t want to spend the extra money, or have the extra maintenance. Next week I’ll share a bit more about some of the other exterior choices we are making, from garage doors to stone to window trim… I’m so excited about the beachy yet traditional feel of the classic exterior we’ve chosen! Here is the updated elevation with our choices!

I’d love to hear what your favorite exterior color choices for a home are! Drop me a comment below…