20 Colorful Ways to Enliven Your Gray Home Office

Gray is without a shadow of a doubt the hottest neutral around, and it has been so for a long while now. No longer just a fleeting trend, the popularity of gray and its many wonderful shades has seen it find space in pretty much every room of the house, including the home office. While a home office in gray does look gorgeous and urbane, adding a bit of color to this setting makes it even more appealing and electric! Offering the perfect neutral backdrop that lets your accent additions and colorful accessories stand out visually, gray home offices are all about design flexibility and versatility.

Dashing contemporary home office blends gray with colorful zest [Design: K&L Interiors]

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With summer long gone and winter not too far away, now is the perfect time to enliven that gray home office by using a bit color and creativity. And in today’s set of inspirations, we look at the three most popular colors that are used with gray in the modern home office: red, blue and orange. Smart, sophisticated and cheerful, these fabulous home offices combine aesthetics with ergonomics in a perfect fashion.

Many Shades of Blue

Blue is a color that effortlessly gels with gray. Much like the different shades of gray, all the wonderful hues of blue also give you a wide array of options to choose from for your dream home office. Blue is far less striking and visually dominating than the other bright colors that we will take a look at below, and this lets you use blue in a more extensive fashion in the gray home office. In fact, you can find a balance between both the colors and can even fill a room with blue and add décor in gray to give it a more spirited appearance.

Giant mirror and a small coffee zone set this home office apart from the usual [Design: Van Metre Homes Design Studio]

Modern industrial home office in gray with a bright blue rug [From: CM Natural Designs / Chipper Hatter]

Pick a shade of blue you absolutely love to enliven the gray home office and crafts zone [Design: Set The Stage]

Stylish contemporary home office in gray and blue [Design: Natasha Tkachuk Design and Decoration]

Traditional home office with a vibrant rug and gray walls [Design: Molly Quinn Design]

Contemporary home office in blue and gray with ample shelf space [Design: Just the Thing Decorating, Staging, and Windows]

Exquisite balance between gray and blue for the home office [Design: Amoura Productions]

The Vivacious Brilliance of Red

While blue is all about elegance and charm, combining red with gray is a bolder and much more dramatic proposition. Red is one of those colors that can instantly transform the ambiance of a room, even when used in a limited fashion. Accents of red in the gray home office look even more splendid, but make sure you do not fill the room with too much red and create a home office that is garish and ungainly. A smart storage unit in bright red, a few floating cabinets in scarlet, a chair and a rug that bring a glowing red hue, or even an accent wall in crimson can revitalize that seemingly mundane and boring home office.

Dashing red credenza steals the show in this home office [Design: Madison Modern Home]

Contemporary home workspace in gray with a hint of red [From: Natalie Fuglestveit Interior Design / Lindsay Nichols Photography]

Exposed brick walls are a cool way to add red to the contemporary home office [Design: Todd Arenson Construction]

Flooring and chair enliven the gray home office with a splash of red [Design: Martha O'Hara Interiors] — Flooring and chair enliven the gray home office with a splash of red [Design: Martha O’Hara Interiors]

Gorgeous striped rug in red brings color to this traditional home office in gray [Design: LuAnn Development / Photography: Bowman Group]

You need not add too much red to brighten the home office in gray [Design: Décoria Interior Designs / Photography: D. Randolph Foulds]

Stunning Victorian home office in gray and red [Design: BAK Interiors]

Spunky Orange

Much like red, orange is a color that can either make your home office look simply incredible and unique or can turn it into a tasteless, unappealing setting depending on how you use it. Once again, we suggest starting out with simple accessories and small accents in orange, and repeating the color in the room gives the home office a more curated look. Keep the rest of the room as neutral as possible and do not use too many colors, and only when you are comfortable with the ‘orangey’ vibe, think about adding something more striking like an accent wall. Admittedly, this is not a color for everyone, but it does give the gray home office a sunny and stylish makeover!