Farrow & Ball Downpipe is a beautiful, moody, statement charcoal, that is a great paint color in small doses like accents, or big ones, like a dramatic color drench!
If you can’t get your hands on the real deal, I’ve got fabulous dupes from other brands to help you get the same look on a budget (or just for the sake of convenience!).
What color is Farrow & Ball Downpipe? (Let’s Talk Undertones!)
Really quickly before we get to the dupes, let’s establish what we are expecting from them.
Farrow and Ball describe Downpipe* as a “lead gray,” which is pretty accurate. On paper, this shade is almost a completely true gray. In real life, the more gray a paint color is, the more it tends to be an unpredictable chameleon!
(Apparently the name is actually two words: Down Pipe, but the vast majority of people use “Downpipe,” so that’s what I am going with!)
So, what are the undertones of Downpipe?
Downpipe most commonly looks charcoal with a fairly strong denim blue undertone.
You may even find that people ask about your “navy” wall color, the undertone is that strong.
It’s second most common undertone is a hint of green. (More like a cool sage green than olive.) I don’t have any great examples of the green undertone, so here is what it looks like using another color:
Of course Downpipe can also look completely gray with very little, to no undertone. We can see that here on an exterior with the darker color F&B Railings on the lower part of the house.
This deep gray color has an LRV of around 13 (they don’t tell us), so it flirts with being both dark and mid-toned.
What’s an LRV?
The LRV (Light Reflectance Value) of a color indicates on a scale of 0 – 100 how much light a color reflects (or doesn’t reflect). True black has an LRV of 0 and pure white has an LRV of 100.
In the paint world, we are working in a range of about 3 – 93 because no paint color is purely black or completely white.
Typically I would say that truly dark paint colors have LRVs of around 10 or less, but because Downpipe is such a true gray, I feel like it can read darker.
Downpipe is too light to ever look black. For that, you may want to take a look at Farrow & Ball Railings.
Let’s get into the dupes!
Get the Downpipe Look From Benjamin Moore
From Benjamin Moore, the best alternative to Downpipe is the shade Bracken Slate.
On paper, Bracken Slate is just a hair darker than Downpipe. In real life, this color is (in my opinion) a perfect twin for Downpipe. It has the same range of undertones, and its most typical look is basically identical.
I don’t find that it looks ANY darker, but the difference in LRV is negligible to begin with.
Sherwin Williams Version of Downpipe
From our friends at Sherwin Williams, the best color match to Downpipe is the shade Roycroft Pewter.
Technically Roycroft Pewter is a little bit more green than Downpipe in terms of color family, however, it is also a little more gray, so that practically cancels out. I don’t find that it is any more likely to look green.
I find that Roycroft Pewter looks about the same as Downpipe, except for that it lacks a little of the depth. Despite this, Roycroft Pewter is the most popular of these dupes by a mile!
Dupe Downpipe at Home Depot (Behr)
Over at the biggest of big box stores, Home Depot has their own excellent Downpipe dupe with the Behr shade Cordite.
Cordite is a little bit warmer than Downpipe, which does make it likely to have the green undertone a little more often. The rest of the undertones are still the same (true gray or blue), except for that when it looks its most green, Cordite can lean more teal than Downpipe ever does.
Cordite was also one of my dupes for Sherwin Williams Grays Harbor, but it is a slightly better match to Downpipe!
Best Valspar Version of Downpipe (Lowe’s)
From Lowe’s, the best alternative to Downpipe is Valspar High-Speed Steel.
High Speed Steel has approximately the same LRV and amount of gray that Downpipe does, but it is from a much more blue color family.
Because it is still so gray, High-Speed Steel can do wildcard gray stuff, and look a little green on occasion. In general, this color is much more likely to look like the typical denim blue of Downpipe. You may find that it can also have a slightly more periwinkle undertone. (Not quite purple, but purple adjacent.)
High-Speed Steel was also my Valspar dupe for Sherwin Williams Peppercorn, but it is a better match for Downpipe.
Here is another look at each of the dupes for Farrow & Ball Downpipe:
Thank you so much for reading until the end! That really helps my blog. Still undecided on your next paint color? Allow me to help! :
