Interior designers are moving away from calm, colour-free homes. So pick a colour that lifts your spirit and gently brightens up your life. Emma Cullinan reports

Minimalism is over, according to trendsetters and many designers, so why do homes with neutral colour palettes and no clutter sell like hot cappuccinos?

Week after week in the Property supplement of The Irish Times yet another home with cream walls, stainless steel kitchens, bare wooden floors and white sofas pop off the estate agents' books and into the lives of grateful new owners.

For years magazines have sold us the dream of calm, colour-free homes in which to escape from an apparently stressed out, mad world. I've been there, at the photo shoots, clearing out the clutter, ironing pillows in situ (yes, on the bed), and importing lilies and orchids in sparse white and glass vases. After all, nobody wants to open a magazine and see a real-life depiction of a bed-and-breakfast establishment.

But, having sold the dream, the magazine world is moving on - blue is this season's colour, while romantic or rough-hewn natural interiors are de rigueur. Even Tracy Emin has heightened her profile with an unmade bed - would that fame came so easily to all messy people.

However, many are finding it difficult to let go of the dream. Creating an interior can be so scary. Choosing colours is enough to bring people out in a rash (paint shade - vermilion). Such is the terror that people are prepared to pay others to choose for them: interior designers who will ask you what your favourite colour is and then put it on the walls. Ahh, neutral colours, so safe that you can't go wrong. Where's the harm in a misplaced cream wall? While trendsetters have to keep setting trends, the rest of the population is still digesting the lessons from previous fashions and the neutral interior has wonderful associations.

It is now synonymous with good taste; light colours make spaces feel bigger, which is great in size-poor new developments and period homes deprived of natural light; neutral shades promote a feeling of clarity; and creams and taupes provide more warmth than white without forcing anyone to make a decision about using real colours. So this look has mass appeal.

If you're selling a home then, by choosing this colour palette, you'll probably reach more potential buyers: ranging from those who actually want this type of interior and will keep the space sparse, to those who feel that they can move in their clutter plus chaotic kids and pets without adding to an already kaleidoscopic ménage.

Ironically, this mélange is probably just what a calm interior requires. Even the doyenne of neutral interiors, Kelly Hoppen, who made a fortune and reputation with her calm East meets West homes, suggests adding splashes of colour to soothing spaces. "Go for neutral palettes and use colour in things you can move, like fabric and beautiful objects," she says - a view shared by many in the interiors world.

People are so keen to get the Kelly Hoppen look that they will order complete room sets, or sideboard displays, from her Fulham Road shop in London, and recreate them exactly at home, she once told me.

Businesses have been quick to spot the taupe appeal, and Fired Earth commissioned and now sells a collection of paints created by Hoppen, called Perfect Neutrals, which range from white and cream through other natural shades of wood, clay, earth and stone. To be fair, she has also created a colour range for the company called Indoctrine, in matt emulsion and lacquer.

"Indoctrine can be used in conjunction with the Perfect Neutrals palette, painting a single wall within a room to highlight it, or the lacquers can be used to vamp-up old trunks, doors, chairs, pots for plants and exteriors of cast-iron baths," says Hoppen.

For, while neutral interiors are initially appealing, they can be relentless places to live in. Even Dawna Walter, clutter-fearing presenter of television's Life Laundry, is wary of a hue-hewn existence.

Colour injects energy into a home, she says. "All the energy in a stark white room must come from the objects and people in it. It's hard work always having to be the centre of attention, which means you can feel drained when sitting in a completely white room for a period of time. If a neutral look is what you're after, take the edge off and add some warmth to the white," she writes in New leaf, New life (Quadrille).

So rather than calming us, neutral territories can actually be exhausting. Yet most of us, in this acquisitive world that's no longer obsessed with cleaning 24/7, have no problem injecting colour into our interiors. That's why neutral is so appealing: it's a cool backdrop to all our stuff.

Perhaps that's why minimalism is such a gasp-worthy goal: instead of bargain hunting in the ever increasing number of shops, minimalists can keep purchases down by pursuing more spiritually rewarding activities. Their homes then display the fact that they can buck the greediness that most humans succumb to when offered goodies.

Many architects have also flirted with stark white boxes recently, a throwback to certain sections of the Modern movement at the beginning of the last century. Modernism came about partly because architecture had been through a messy time. Historically, there had been distinct architectural styles associated with certain periods and, then, in the late 18th and 19th centuries, designers went down memory lane, producing buildings that borrowed from past styles; some successfully and some less so.

Modernism was an attempt to wipe the slate clean and start again with a new, simple style that addressed technological changes of the industrial age. It enabled architects to head off in a new design direction, although post-Modernists eventually harped back to eclectic mishmashing of past styles.

Perhaps our flirtation with clean, pale homes is a new attempt to stop the design clock while we think of where to go next. Sustainable design using natural objects now beckons and natural paint colours, offered by many companies such as Irish-owned General Paints, are progressing from neutrals.

We've geared ourselves into neutral from a past strewn with swirly carpets and flock wallpaper. My how we laugh at such embellishment but what bravery! Every season we're told that wallpaper has made a come back, and we're tempted with fabulous new designs, but many have had their fingers burned in the past and will just stick to paint for now, thanks. Accent walls, in strong colours, are the first step. You don't need to colour the whole room, just one wall for that energy injection.

The other option is to paint whole rooms in pastel, something that many interior designers will scoff at because it's not bold enough, but they won't have to live with it. Pick a colour that lifts your spirit and gently brighten up your life or stick with the neutral palette and inject colour in other ways: perhaps through your sparkling personality.