You can buy your dog a puzzle feeder, put on “dog TV,” and leave a shirt that smells like you. Then you walk in the door and still find a shredded pillow or chew marks on your coffee table. At that point, you start wondering if your home itself is actually part of the problem.
One idea making the rounds comes from Dr. Eleni Nicolaou, an art therapist and creative wellness expert at Davincified, who says we forget how much pets absorb from the rooms they live in. “We tend to forget that our pets are absorbing their environment in ways we can never fully appreciate,” Nicolaou says. “Dogs may not see color the way we do, but that doesn’t mean they’re unaffected by it. The visual tone of a room can either soothe them or add to their stress.”
Dogs don’t see the full rainbow humans do. The American Kennel Club explains that dogs are closer to red-green color blindness, with blues and yellows coming through better, while reds skew duller, closer to gray or brown. That means your “warm, energizing” accent wall can land as a muddy block of contrast to your dog.
Nicolaou says the bigger issue is “visual noise,” which means high contrast, clashing colors, and busy décor that can overstimulate a dog’s visual processing. “Think of visual noise as the canine equivalent of a loud, chaotic room,” she says. “High-contrast patterns, bright clashing colors, and busy wall art can overstimulate a dog’s visual processing.”
your ugly orange house is stressing out your dog
If your dog already struggles when they’re alone, extra stimulation won’t help. The ASPCA says that distress during separation can manifest as barking, chewing, digging, accidents in the house, or escape attempts. Training and enrichment still do most of the work, but the room your dog sits in for hours deserves a quick audit, too.
Nicolaou flags bright reds and oranges, stark black-and-white designs, and fluorescent, heavily saturated colors as common offenders. Her suggestion for a calmer baseline is soft sage green, since it sits in a range that reads neutral to dogs and feels closer to outdoor tones. “Sage green falls within a range that dogs can perceive as a calm, neutral tone,” she says. “It doesn’t create harsh contrasts, and it mimics the natural outdoor tones that dogs find instinctively comforting.”
No need to repaint the house because your dog had a bad Tuesday. Nicolaou suggests small swaps in the space where your dog spends alone time. “You don’t need a complete home makeover,” she says. “Simply be mindful of the visual environment your pet lives in.”
Start with the dog bed cover, a blanket, or removing one high-contrast rug that looks great on Instagram and overstimulates a dog who has hours to kill.
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