Haint Blue for the Porch Ceiling

While vacationing recently in Savannah, Georgia, we saw many beautiful, historic homes with wonderful front porches. It was not unusual to find the ceilings of the porches painted a color often referred to here in the south as "haint blue."

Back in the day, folks could be pretty superstitious. Many believed if you painted the front ceiling of your porch haint blue, it would look like water and keep the haints, (restless ghosts and bad spirits) from entering into your home, because as everybody knows, haints can't cross water. What? You didn't know that? ;)

Well, I'm not really the superstitious kind (knock on wood) but I love tradition, folk lore and just some old fashioned, southern nonsense from time to time. It's fun and keeps life interesting, if you know what I mean.

I almost painted the ceiling of my front porch blue when I added it to my home a few years back. In the end I decided it might not work so well with the Benjamin Moore, Heritage Red paint I had chosen for the front door, so I ended up going with white.

Let's take a look at some homes with ceilings painted haint blue. This grand home in Savannah was sporting a blue ceiling. Let's cross the street and take a closer look.

Do you see the blue?  You can tour the inside of this home in THIS post.

Definitely a haint blue ceiling if I've ever seen one.

Remember this home I shared in Isle of Hope a few days ago. Yep, a blue ceiling?

The porch ceiling of this home in Grant Park was painted a pretty shade of haint blue.

When we toured the beautiful homes and gardens in Greenwood, SC we saw more homes with blue ceilings.

If you've been reading BNOTP for a while, you may remember the tour we took of this Second Empire (Mansard) historic home on the Newnan Ramble.

We get a glimpse of the ceiling here and it's a pretty haint blue shade. So, you may be wondering, how do you chose the right blue if you're going for a haint blue porch ceiling?

After I posted HERE about so many porch ceilings being painted haint blue here in the south, Lori with Color Strategies sent me samples of some of the blues that are considered historically correct haint blue colors. Thanks, Lori!


I scanned the samples Lori sent into my computer and I've posted them below in case you are looking for that perfect shade of haint blue. All colors below are Benjamin Moore Paint Colors. I think my favorites are Ohio Haint Blue-Light and La Maison Bleu-Light.

First Set:
All Benjamin Moore: Top: La Maison Bleu-Dark; Middle: La Maison Bleu-Light; Bottom: La Maison Bleu-Medium

Second Set:
All Benjamin Moore: Top, Savannah Haint Blue-Light; Bottom: Savannah Haint Blue-Dark

Third Set:
All Benjamin Moore: Top: Ohio Haint Blue-Dark; Bottom: Ohio Haint Blue-Light

You can read more about the legend behind the color haint blue in this article written by Lori HERE.

While in Savannah, we had to go on one of the many, many ghost tours offered in this city that claims to be the most haunted city of all. Yep, that was our tour mobile.

One of our stops was the Warren A Candler Hospital, the very first hospital in the state of Georgia. This hospital is believed to be the second oldest general hospital in continuous operation in the United States. During the War Between the States, the hospital was used to care for Confederate soldiers, so this building has tremendous history and supposedly a lot of ghosts.

It has long since been closed and unfortunately left to fall to ruin. Of course, our tour guide said no one will touch it because it's so haunted. (Cough, cough) Our guide dared us to set foot on the balcony and I couldn't resist a little ghostly fun. I have some pics from the ghost tour of some of Savannah's most haunted spots. Let me know in a comment if you would like to see those and I'll post them sometime. :)

You can click on any of the highlighted links in this post to see tours of more beautiful homes here in the south.

Also, there's a great article HERE in the Washington Post about painting porch ceilings blue. They mention some other great colors you may wish to consider. One is Benjamin Moore's, Caribbean Breeze.

See you this evening for Tablescape Thursday!