Colour Matching Service
Send us the thing.
We’ll match it.
A tile. A cushion. A flake of paint off the back of a door. We don’t send you the nearest colour we already sell — we mix a brand new one to match the object you post us, in our own eco paint.
- A colour of your ownmixed to order, kept on file
- 3–5 working daysfrom the day it arrives
- No surchargesame price as a standard colour
- Under ΔE 1read on a spectrophotometer
Post us one of these
- Day 0posted
- Day 1read & confirmed
- Days 2–4mixed & drawn down
- Days 3–5arrives
Secret Cinema #743236
A burgundy wall became Secret Cinema. Match yours — from £33.95
Try it yourself
How close is the closest colour we already sell?
Move the dropper over any of these — or drop a picture of your own in. It reads the colour under it, then searches all 152 colours in our range for the nearest one and tells you how far off it is. Sometimes we already sell what you are pointing at. Usually we do not — and that gap is exactly what the matching service is for.
Move across the image — or drop a photo here
Point at the image and we will tell you whether you need us.
Get this colour matched Or check it first — A5 hand-painted sample, £1.50Distance is CIEDE2000, the international standard for how different two colours look to a person — not how different their numbers are.
All 152 colours we stock, nearest first
Point at the image and they re-order by distance
Order the nearest six as A5 samples — £9.00 Browse all our colours
What the instrument sees
A colour is a curve, not three numbers
Your screen makes every colour out of three lamps. A painted surface does something else entirely: it throws back a different amount of every wavelength that hits it, and that shape is what a spectrophotometer measures. It is why an instrument can separate two colours that look identical under one bulb and wrong under another — and why we read your sample rather than look at it.
Illustration, not a measurement: the curve is reconstructed from the colour on your screen. The shape is faithful; the reading is not one of ours. The real curve comes off the instrument, with your sample under it.
Penally Garden #A0B295
The one thing we cannot work from
A photograph is not a colour
Cameras and screens both guess. Drag the dial: one object, one photograph, relit from a tungsten bulb to an overcast sky. The hex underneath is read off the panel as it moves. Match from the picture and the paint will be wrong in the room — which is why we ask you to post us the thing itself.
The same surface, lit differently. Nothing about the object changed.
ΔE 26 between the warmest and coldest ends of this dial — and a ΔE of 3 is already a colour most people can see is wrong.
Worse still, two colours can match under one light and separate under another. That is metamerism, it is common in paint, and it is the single best reason to judge a colour on a hand-painted sample in your own room rather than on a screen.
Simulated: one photograph with a black-body white-balance gain applied in your browser, not a series of separate photographs. The effect on a real camera is the same and usually larger.
The number behind a good match
How close is close enough?
Colour difference has a unit. ΔE is how far apart two colours look to a human being, and the scale is unforgiving: at ΔE 5 you are looking at a different colour, at 2 you can find the join if you go looking, and somewhere below 1 the eye gives up. Drag until the seam disappears — wherever that happens is your own limit, and everybody’s is different.
Two clearly different colours. Nobody would accept this as a match.
We work to a tolerance under ΔE 1.
Your sample is read on a spectrophotometer — an instrument that measures the light a surface reflects, rather than an eye deciding what it looks like. A commercial tolerance below ΔE 1 is the point at which the difference between your object and the paint stops being visible to a person. It is a harder number to hit than “95% accurate”, and a much easier one to check.
Start to finish
Four steps and a fortnight less than anyone else
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Day 0
Post us the object
A fabric swatch, a tile, a length of trim, a piece of wallpaper, or a chip of the existing paint on wood or card. It does not need to be big — a thumbnail-sized piece is plenty, as long as the colour on it is clean and true. If all you have is a reference — a discontinued shade name, another brand’s code, a BS 4800, RAL or NCS number — send that instead and skip the post.
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Day 1
We read it, and we confirm it
Your sample goes under the spectrophotometer, which measures the light the surface reflects and turns it into numbers no eye could produce. We come back to you with what we have read before anything is mixed — nothing goes into a tin until you have agreed it.
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Days 2–4
We mix it, and we draw it down
The formula is mixed fresh into whichever of our bases your finish needs, then drawn down on card and re-read against your sample. If it is not inside tolerance it is adjusted and drawn down again. This is the step that takes the time, and it is the step that is worth it.
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Days 3–5
It arrives, as paint
Your colour, in your finish, in your size, at the same price as any standard colour on the site. Vegan, virtually VOC free, made in Britain, and yours — we keep the formula on file, so the second tin in three years’ time is a phone call.
Three to five working days from the day your sample lands. Elsewhere in the category the same job is quoted at up to three weeks, or comes with a surcharge, or can only match a name someone has already put in a database.
Actually sent to us
Things people have posted us
We have matched a dressing gown. We have matched sweet wrappers. We have matched a rock somebody picked up on a beach. If the colour on it is clean and true, the object does not have to make sense.
- A dressing gownbecame a bedroom
- Sweet wrappersbecame a downstairs loo
- A rockbecame a kitchen
- A discontinued tinbecame the rest of the hall
- A fabric swatchbecame the woodwork
- A single tilebecame a bathroom
What we can match, and what we can’t
Send us any of this
- A piece of the existing paint — a flake, a chip, or a patch on wood or card
- A discontinued colour from any brand, past or present
- A named shade or code from another manufacturer
- BS 4800, RAL and NCS references
- A fabric, a tile, a piece of wallpaper, a length of trim
We can’t work from this
- A photograph, or a colour on a screen — cameras and monitors both shift colour, and a match made from an image will not hold in the room
- A sample so small or so dirty that the colour on it is not clean and true
- Anything glossy enough that the light bounces off it rather than out of it
Not sure whether what you have will work? Call us on 01258 841310 before you post it.
What it costs
Exactly what a standard colour costs
There is no colour-matching fee, no minimum order and no premium for a bespoke shade. You are buying a tin of our paint; we are just deciding what goes in it together.
Matt Emulsion — almost no specular bounce, so the colour reads as the pigment rather than the light. Rub Resistance Class 1 to BS EN 13300, the top class, on our standard matt.
The panel above is a simulation of how much light a finish bounces back. It is a fair illustration of sheen, not a rendering of your colour — for that, order a sample.
| Finish | Size | Price | Order |
|---|---|---|---|
| Matt Emulsion | 2.5 Litres | £54 | Order Matt Emulsion in 2.5 Litres |
| Matt Emulsion | 5 Litres | £75 | Order Matt Emulsion in 5 Litres |
| Kitchen / Bathroom Emulsion (Soft Sheen) | 2.5 Litres | £55 | Order Kitchen / Bathroom Emulsion (Soft Sheen) in 2.5 Litres |
| Kitchen / Bathroom Emulsion (Soft Sheen) | 5 Litres | £76 | Order Kitchen / Bathroom Emulsion (Soft Sheen) in 5 Litres |
| Interior Wood / Metal Eggshell | 2.5 Litres | £64.95 | Order Interior Wood / Metal Eggshell in 2.5 Litres |
| Interior Wood / Metal Eggshell | 5 Litres | £105.95 | Order Interior Wood / Metal Eggshell in 5 Litres |
| Interior Wood / Metal Eggshell | 1 Litre | £41.95 | Order Interior Wood / Metal Eggshell in 1 Litre |
| Exterior Wood / Metal Eggshell | 2.5 Litres | £64.95 | Order Exterior Wood / Metal Eggshell in 2.5 Litres |
| Exterior Wood / Metal Eggshell | 5 Litres | £105.95 | Order Exterior Wood / Metal Eggshell in 5 Litres |
| Exterior Wood / Metal Eggshell | 1 Litre | £41.95 | Order Exterior Wood / Metal Eggshell in 1 Litre |
| Masonry Paint | 5 Litres | £85 | Order Masonry Paint in 5 Litres |
| Matt Emulsion | 1 Litre | £33.95 | Order Matt Emulsion in 1 Litre |
While the tin is being mixed
Complete the room
A matched colour looks its best on a wall that is ready for it. We are not a paint-only shop — paintable Anaglypta takes a bespoke colour beautifully, a liner turns a rough wall into a flat one, and the adhesive is here too. One delivery, one shop.
Questions people ask first
How long does a colour match take?
Three to five working days from the day your sample or reference reaches us, and that includes mixing the paint itself. If you are posting something, add the post. There is no rush fee because there is no slow option — that is simply how long it takes.
Does a matched colour cost more than a standard one?
No. A colour-matched tin costs exactly what the same size and finish costs in one of our own colours. There is no matching fee and no minimum order. Most paint companies either charge a surcharge for this or do not offer it at all.
What can you match from?
A piece of the existing paint — a flake, a chip, or a patch on wood or card. A discontinued colour from any brand, past or present. A named shade or code from another manufacturer. BS 4800, RAL and NCS references. Or a physical object: a fabric, a tile, a piece of wallpaper, a length of trim. We only need a small area, as long as the colour on it is clean and true.
Can you match a colour from a photograph?
No, and we would rather say so than take the order. Cameras and screens both shift colour, so the same object photographed under a bulb, by a window and on a monitor gives three different colours. A match made from an image will not hold in the room. Post us the object instead — a thumbnail-sized piece is enough.
How accurate is the match?
Your sample is read on a spectrophotometer, which measures the light the surface reflects rather than relying on an eye, and we work to a commercial tolerance under Delta E 1 — the point below which a colour difference stops being visible to a person. A match is still not a photocopy: finish, sheen and the light in your room all change how a colour reads, so a matt version of a silk colour will look slightly different. That is physics rather than a mistake.
Which finishes can I have it in?
Matt Emulsion, Kitchen and Bathroom Emulsion in soft sheen, Interior and Exterior Wood and Metal Eggshell, and Masonry. Same paint as the rest of the range: vegan, virtually VOC free, and made in Britain.
Can I return colour-matched paint?
Not unless it is faulty. Every matched tin is mixed to order for one customer, so there is nothing to put it back on a shelf for. This is exactly why we confirm the reading with you before anything is mixed, and why we would rather you sent us the object than a photograph of it.
If I run out, can I get the same colour again?
Yes. We keep your formula on file, so a second tin in three years is a phone call on 01258 841310 rather than another sample in the post. It is one of the reasons people who use the matching service tend to come back.
Have you got the thing in front of you?
Then you have got everything you need. Order the tin, tell us what you are matching, and post us the object. We will do the rest in three to five working days.
Or email info@victorycolours.co.uk and ask us whether what you have will work — we would rather tell you before you post it.
Which finish do I need? A5 hand-painted samples, £1.50 All our colours