The person choosing colors is planning how separate things will live together.

Choosing a colour is never about one colour. Each decision is really a decision about relationships: how the wall will sit next to the floor, how the cover will look beside the others on a shelf, what happens at six in the evening when the light goes orange. The work is arranging coexistence, which is why it is harder than it looks and why samples on a small card mislead.

Hold your options together rather than one at a time, in the actual room, at the hour you will use it. Ask what has to get along with what. Most colour mistakes are really mistakes about company.