Hue to-do

They found instead a color they could love: clementine.

But their closest neighbors did not love clementine, a vivid, reddish-orange that lit up the street like a campfire against the shadows. Last month, the neighbors sued Mary Ann Williamson and the building's two other condo owners, arguing that the color pervades their own house, creating a glow "so intense as to be blinding to the naked eye."

The clementine paint had received the blessing of the local overseers of historical accuracy, the color police at the Salem Historical Commission. Clementine was among 149 shades developed by the Society for the Preservation of New England Antiquities, which notes that new research and scientific techniques have revealed some surprisingly flamboyant colors in centuries past.

"The quintessential storybook New England village with all white houses and a white church is really a figment of early 20th-century imagination," said Frederick W. Lyman, president of American Landmarks, real estate brokers and preservation consultants in Winchester. "It didn't really happen that way."

Gone are the days when the surviving houses of early America could be bathed only in muted hues or stark white. But the broader palette of colors recognized as historically accurate can create more tangles in historic districts, with the commissions that must often approve the colors and the neighbors who must gaze at them daily.

In Lexington, where the Historic Districts Commission has a reputation for strictness, homeowners are now more likely to request permission to paint their house a color, rather than white, reversing trends from five or 10 years ago, said Joann Gschwendtner, the commission's chairwoman. As the district has grown more colorful, she said, commissioners must make sure the requests do not clash with the style of the house or neighbors' homes.

"We don't want things to look like a basket of Easter eggs," she said.

In Hingham, homeowners have generally been more conservative; gray is a current favorite among petitions to the Historic Districts Commission. The commissioners offer informal color guidance before they vote, and only occasionally reject color choices, said Sally C. Weston, the commission's former chairwoman and now an alternate member.

Sometimes, though, the commissioners have asked owners to repaint when a color turned out brighter than they had expected, once requesting a new paint job on a bright green house trim. But not always: A few years ago, a house on historic Main Street was painted a brighter yellow than commissioners expected, but the paint remains.

Most homeowners can paint their houses any color they choose. But many cities and towns have created historic districts, where local officials must approve any significant changes to houses. In most communities, that includes signing off on changes to the exterior colors of the house -- though many towns, like Hingham, require no permission to paint a house white.

As preservationists have discovered colorful hues in some historical houses and other artifacts, historical groups have seen a market for more vivid paint colors.

This fall, the Mount Vernon Ladies' Association, the preservation group that owns George Washington's Virginia estate, announced that they were granting the licensing rights to a paint line. Although the color chart includes plenty of neutrals like Olde Manuscript and Thrashed Wheat, the colors that "so inspired our nation's preeminent forefather" include an orange called "Sunburst" and a range of greens bright enough to pierce the deepest fog.

"Primarily, what people might think of as historic colors are generally more of a muted tone because what you can see has usually faded," said James Lee, property care manager for the Society for the Preservation of New England Antiquities. "In fact, some of the colors were quite a bit more vibrant than one would expect."

About a decade ago, the trustees of the Ferrisburgh, Vt., Rokeby House, a 200-year-old family farm that harbored fugitive slaves as an Underground Railroad site, decided to repaint. The earliest paint that researchers could detect on the house was sienna and dated to the 1890s. After several weeks of debate, trustees chose a similar color.

"It raised some eyebrows," said Thomas Visser, a professor of historic preservation at the University of Vermont. "The diplomatic way is, `Concerns were raised by some of the board members,' since this is a rather unusual paint scheme."

Some less traditional preservationists see color as a mark of personal taste that doesn't permanently mar the historic attributes of a house. Salem's Historical Commission once considered, but ultimately rejected, getting out of the business of approving house colors.

"Many historic preservationists look at the color of the paint on the outside of a building as an issue that is something that can be changed very easily in the future," Visser said. "Therefore, for many people, it's not as much of a concern. It's this notion of reversibility."

On Federal Street in Salem, the sidewalks are laid in brick and the houses wear nametags bearing their pedigree. No. 102, the house now painted clementine, was built in 1800 by a cabinetmaker named George Whitefield Martin.

The owners of the building's three condominiums had saved money for several years to repaint the peeling beige clapboards. Home owner Williamson was attracted to a picture of the 1743 Martha G. Pitman house restored in Newport, R.I., and painted a shade called "pumpkin."

The Newport project used the paints licensed by the antiquities society and manufactured by California Paints, an Andover-based company. When Williamson saw the paint chart, she fell in love with clementine.

The other condo owners also liked the color, and they took their request to the Salem Historical Commission, which approved their application after two meetings. Only Lance Kasparian, the commission's chairman, voted against the color, fearing clementine would stand out on the muted street and clash with the brick sidewalk.

The house was painted at the end of the summer. When it was finished, the next-door neighbors pleaded with them to repaint, Williamson said. David Hart and Barbara Cleary eventually sued, arguing that the distressing orange light keeps them from using most of the rooms in their house.

Hart, an architect and videographer, said he can no longer work in the rooms permeated by orange. The couple declined to comment on the case.

The neighbors are now negotiating and hope to resolve the dispute outside a courtroom. The owners of 102 Federal have said they would repaint the house if Hart and Cleary agree to pay for it, about $10,000.

Said Williamson: "I really would like this to have a good ending."

Kathleen Burge can be reached at kburge@globe.com.