We are painting the exterior of our 1970s house, which has a lot of orange/red brick. What colours would work for the painted areas, to minimise the impact of the brick (we are not fans of brick work but cannot paint over it for budget reasons)?

It depends how much painted area there is available to modify the impact of the brick. The existing roof colour also needs to be taken into account and whether you have aluminium or wooden windows.

Investigate the following colour scheme: Resene Quarter Thorndon Cream for window/door joinery, Resene Thorndon Cream under soffits/roofline fascias and base boards, Resene Triple Thorndon Cream for weatherboards, Resene Half Gravel for the garage door and Resene Armadillo for the front door.

These colours are tonally earthy and might just tie in the shadow on the brick and the natural mortar grout. A tonal colour palette will add a pleasing balance to the house and not make the bricks one of the more obvious multi-coloured elements on the house.