Joanna Gaines shows us how to embrace the green kitchen trend in style

It's easy to play it safe with kitchen cabinets, but queen of shiplap and green lover Joanna Gaines has shown you can totally make a color work. In a recent episode of Fixer Upper: Welcome Home, the interior designer gave her client a gorgeous green kitchen that fits seamlessly with her otherwise neutral home.

There are plenty of green kitchen ideas to inspire, from rich forest green and emerald tiles to barely-there shades of sage. Joanna Gaines, who once described a green, white and black palette as 'the story of [her] life,' shows us how to go green.

Joanna's client, Kim, recently moved from California with her dog Hank to Waco, to work for Magnolia Network. Swapping her tiny beach apartment for a three-bedroom 1930s home, she wanted a light and bright scheme for her 'cottage getaway' home. 

When she and Jo sat down to run through the interior design ideas for each room, Jo floated the idea of a green kitchen. 'We were thinking of doing this really pretty green cabinet,' she says, showing Kim samples of two slightly different green tones. 

'That, I have to say, usually scares me,' responds Kim. 'Color does a little bit, only because it's out of my comfort zone.' They agree on a fairly dark and muted blue-green, which will be given brass accents with the cabinet door handles.

The kitchen before the makeover

The green cabinets work in the kitchen because there's lots of natural light flooding in and a view of the trees out in the yard. The green tones tie in with the natural hues beyond the windows and the rest of the room is a crisp white, from the walls and ceiling to the lampshades and even the casserole dish on the cooker.

There is also plenty of natural wood, with the traditional oak floorboards allowing the green cabinets to stand out. Overall, the green tone is introduced in a very subtle fashion - the green cabinetry creates interest without a gear change that you'd get if you used a bolder tone.

Previously, the kitchen was much darker and felt far smaller. At the reveal, Jo comments that the darker tone of the green helps to ground the space. 

If, like Kim, you have a kitchen with a view of the backyard, green works particularly well. Elsewhere in the kitchen, stick to whites, a warm metal tone like copper or bronze, and wood tones if you're worried about it becoming too much.

If you want to hear more about her design transformations, take a look at the noughties trend Joanna Gaines is bringing back, too.