Color marketing is one of my biggest pet peeves. The latest commercial from one of the largest paint merchandisers out there goes something like, “Let’s get this year’s colors on the wall this year.” With that sort of logic you had better have a full time Eldon on staff, (Murphy Brown reference), or just like to paint in  whatever spare time you happen to have. I think your kids, spouse, boyfriend, or whomever at this point is likely to have you committed!

Also, the notion that we can somehow predict color trends, is something of a self fulfilling prophecy. After all as the picture above illustrates, it is not likely to start raining red anytime soon. Color trends are not inherent in nature. Trends are established by industry professionals who gather together in cabals to determine, or DECIDE if you will, what colors are going to pop up in fashion, home furnishings, and ultimately paint colors. Did you know that there is such a thing as the Color Marketing Guild? I’m not suggesting for a moment that what they are doing is nefarious or sinister in anyway. I am just pointing out that they are doing it.

Rather than trying to keep up with the ever changing color trends necessary to keep some folks in a job at major paint companies, I think it is a far more sensible approach (and environmentally friendly I might add), to choose from a palette that defies trendiness without sacrificing aesthetics. So don’t be lured into a painting party of young hipsters splashing hot pink on the walls, only to wake up to a hangover nightmare, (last year’s commercial from the same merchandiser). You will grow tired of these colors in no time as they often times are rooted more in cosmetics and fashion rather than nature. Remember, just because that color looks good on you as a dress doesn’t mean that you want to stare at it day in and day out on your walls. These two things are not the same yet time after time attempts are made to sell paint as if they were.

Philip’s rule of thumb on this is, if you are seeing it advertised on television, you probably don’t want it! There are so many other reputable sources for color inspiration, I would think that commercials should be the last place we look for it. House Beautiful magazine does a great job of publishing designer favorite colors each month. I recommend checking out this feature in every issue. I know I love to see what other professionals are recommending. Regardless, don’t be afraid of color, it may be difficult to get right but once you do you will never go back.

Metamerism is the cause of so many of our color problems, yet few of us know what it is or can explain it even if we do know. Let’s start with a dictionary definition. Metamerism: the visual difference between two color standards when viewed under different light sources. So what this is saying is that it is possible for two colors to appear identical under incandescent light, and yet appear completely different from one another under flourescent or daylight. As the photo above illustrates, in a very dim light we might mistake Cher for Ozzy Osbourne, but in daylight the truth will be revealed! This is an extreme example I used just for fun and to try to get the point across. Our eyes play tricks on us.

I have found it to be true that most of my clients find it is easier to pick out just about any other element for a room rather than the paint color. Clients come to me all the time with carpet samples, fabric samples, tile samples, etc. looking for the perfect color to go with them. They seem to have less trouble picking out these other elements, but when it comes to the paint color, they are stymied. Furthermore, often times they come to me after having picked a color from another manufacturer and once they get it on the wall it doesn’t look a thing like they expected and it no longer seems to co-ordinate with the other elements in the room. What is going on here?

Most of the other elements that we are chosing, be it fabric or tile, are much more complex than your average paint color. There is a translucency and three dimensionality to these items that causes them to reflect light in a myriad of ways. When we view them next to your run-of-the-mill paint color it will invariable appear “flat” and lifeless. This is due in large part to the dumbed down way that most manufacturers formulate their colors. Almost all commercially available paints are formulated with 2 to 3 pigments at maximum. We are given thousands of bad choices, so it is no wonder that it is so difficult to choose successfully.

Another interesting fact that most people are not aware of is that almost all paint chips that you see are not even made from the paint itself. Who knew? Imagine getting a carpet sample, or granite sample that was made from some other material, and then being told that the real thing will look something like it. You can see why this is a wholely unsatifying solution; yet it is the one we  have been living with for decades. As we discussed in Part 4, playing the same note out of a different instument will give us a different sound. In this case we are not even talking about the same notes, since these paint chips are generally made using lacquers that don’t employ the exact same pigments.

So where these two worlds collide is that manufactureres, in order to minimize the metamerism between their paint chips (not made from real paint) and the actual paint, formulate colors with extremely  simple pigment structures. These formulations then have a tendency to look flat (two dimensional) and lifeless when we put them on the wall. We’ve all seen paint colors that just sit there and do nothing once we get them on the wall. No singing, no music…no fun!

So the real problem here is not that traditional paint colors don’t change color at different times of day. All paint colors will change color under differing light sources. The real problem is that traditional manufacturers are so busy making formulas to match their laquer paint chips that they create colors that are by definition uninteresting and lifeless on the wall. At the same time it is not simply a matter of combining some blue, red, and yellow pigments together and voila…a beautiful color that goes with everything! There is artistry involved in developing and honing full spectrum colors that resonate with our “collective color consciousness”, and our natural surroundings. One way or the other the object is to create beautiful colors that are pleasing to the eye.

Next Part 6…Color Marketing,  eeh gads:)

If we imagine a musical instrument playing the note of middle C over and over and over again, it won’t be long before it literally becomes monotonous and irritating to our ears. In much the same way if we construct a paint color using only one chromatic pigment, say bright yellow, it may be perfectly pleasing at first, but eventually it won’t be soothing to the eye.

By adding another note, this time E, we construct a musical dyad. While this may be more interesting than the single note, it is still  incomplete. Similarly a paint color constructed with two pigments, this time we’ll add blue, is more enticing than one made from only one pigment, but still feels incomplete. There is something oddly missing from the equation.

When we add a third note we have created a basic chord. This has a resonance that is very comfortable to our ears. Likewise when we add a third pigment, this time red, we have joined the primary colors together in a combination that creates a more pleasing color. This is the basic concept inherent in full spectrum color mixing. So we can’t have what I term, “musical colors” unless we have a minimum of three chromatic pigments, but why stop there? We can go on combining complementary pigments until we create highly luminous colors that seduce our eyes and connect with us on a deeply emotional level.

One more thing to consider in our musical analogy is timbre, know in psycho acoustics as sound quality or sound “color”. It is worth noting that just as different musical instruments create differing sounds when playing the same note, different paint sheens give differing renditions of the same pigment structures. For example high gloss paint, which reflects light in one direction, can be compared to a piccolo with it’s unmistakable yet limited sound.  Eggshell paint is much more versatile and can be considered the middle range of a piano, scattering light in a wider range.  Flat paint which reflects light in all directions gives us the most robust rendering of any pigment combination, similar to a cello. It is considered the most elegant of sheens and is often inappropriately specified as a result. Practically speaking kitchens and bathrooms are not a place for flat paint. So let’s not forget sheen is an extremely important part of our color selection.

Next up…metamerism!

Let’s talk a bit about color theory. When we speak of color theory it is important to remember that we are talking about a theory. Color theories have been evolving since antiquity and will continue on until the end of time. In fact if we go back to the time of Aristotle we see that he believed in a color scale that ranged from black to white with all of the other colors falling somewhere in between. Plato believed that mere mortals couldn’t understand the mysteries of colors at all, this was God’s territory alone.

It is not until we reach the period of the Renaissance that the modern day color wheel, like the one above, began to emerge. Sir Isaac Newton in his Treatise on Opticks was the first to begin speaking about color in this circular fashion. So all theories have a life span of sorts and are only held sacred until something else comes along to disprove them. I make this point only to try to get us to think outside of the accepted norm.

Did you know that Van Gogh studied piano in order to improve his painting technique? Kandinsky, an early twentieth century abstract painter was a syn-aesthete, a person who experiences a stimulus in more than one sense. He believed that he could hear color! Van Gogh’s teacher through him out of the class because he thought he was crazy, and you might think I am a little bit too, but follow me if you will on a little musical journey.

Have you ever seen a quiet color? Have you ever heard a color sing? Even though these statements don’t make logical sense you probably have some idea what I am talking about. So how are music and color connected? Quite simply a quiet color or one that sings is a color that is balanced and harmonious much like a finely crafted piece of music. Stay tuned.

A philosopher I once read asked the question, “Do we actually see anything at all?” What he meant by this question was are we capable of seeing anything objectively, or is all of our seeing influenced or colored in some way by our history, culture, or other subconscious biases? So I ask the question, “Do we see color objectively, or is all of our color seeing influenced by our history, culture or other subconscious biases? I’ll ask another question. Did you wake up this morning and decide today what colors you like and which ones you don’t? Did you do this yesterday and are you planning on doing it again tomorrow.  Most likely the answer is no. So where does our color preference come from?

We have what I like to call a collective cultural color consciousness. I know it’s a mouthful. The psychologist Carl Jung wrote extensively on the subject of our collective unconscious. Is it not reasonable to conjecture that much of our color preferences have been filtered down to our subconscious minds through historically preserved works of art and ultimately by the very nature that surrounds us?

So if we look at the art that has most heavily influenced this color consciousness in Western Civilization we will come to the period commonly referred to as The Renaissance. Artists such as Michelangelo, DaVinci, Bellini, and others helped to inform our color consciousness by their master works created using the natural pigments available to them at the time. Their works have been enshrined in cathedrals and museums throughout the western world. Western religion played an important role by embedding the palette of these masters into our consciousness as early as childhood, since they were often the patrons of these artists.

You see what we have here is a color trend that has lasted more than 500 years! Now that is one worth paying attention to.

I’ve decide to start the new year off by publishing my color presentation, “Why We Gravitate Towards Certain Colors”, on this blog. I will publish weekly installments until it is completely represented here. Keep in mind that the content of all of these posts are copyrighted and not authorized for any sort of reproduction without expressed consent by myself.

With that said let’s get started. Why do we gravitate towards certain colors? You know they say if you live long enough you might just learn something along the way. After more than 30 years in the business of color in one fashion or another, I’ve observed that despite one color trend after another, we invariably rely on a core palette of classic colors when doing high end design work. What is it about the quality  of certain colors that makes them so timeless and appealing? Great design never goes out of style, it only gets better with time.

I think it is important to look at a dictionary definition of color; the sensation resulting from stimulation of the retina of the eye by light waves of certain lengths. The words sensation and stimulation strike me as important keywords on our color journey.

The word color can be used in many different ways. It can be a noun, (red, blue, yellow), a verb, (to change something’s appearance), or as an adjective, (color picture, color monitor). It is also used to describe our emotional state or moods and feelings (remember having a blue day?) It is worth noting that more often than not when I hear people talking about colors they say the color feels right or doesn’t feel right. Yes we are actually feeling something when we are in the presence of color. The rods and cones in our eyes are literally vibrating causing us to see color but also allowing us to feel it as well. Many experiments have been done on the behavior of children and others when surrounded by certain colors. The results of these show us how vulnerable and sensitive we are as creatures to the color of our surroundings. I have witnessed the emotional results of this challenge with many of my clients through the years.

Ultimately color is a “perceptual function of light.” In the absence of light there is no color to behold.