Discovering that Pantone’s Colour of the Year for 2019 was Living Coral, my first inclination was to determine the significance of this choice. If you’ve read my Pantone 2019 blog, you’ll see it was selected for its clear socio-environmental significance. This seemed very positive, however: I was motivated to reflect on how colour leadership works and can be observed.
I began looking for this current trendy colour everywhere. I looked in fashion and decorating magazines, in media, in fashion, paint and furnishing stores, even on the street. I started observing this colour use in products varying from: household and craft paints, to plastics to metals, to natural fabrics (cotton, linen) and synthetics (polyester, nylon). I looked at surface treatments from coated and uncoated to glossy or matte finish. I was looking for any and all use of Living Coral and its association with the natural world and our ecological circumstance.
I had long been aware of Pantone’s colour authority leadership. Pantone as configured today had its roots back in the 1950s; that decade saw plastics and primary colours more prevalent, especially in baby toys. That latter association remains as early childhood education continues to focus on primary colour differentiation. However, I was, until recently, unaware of Pantone’s evolving background and how it was launched, restructured, and became such an industry leader on colour choice. It will be helpful to know more about this self-defined colour institute, its influence and operations.
As a 1955 baby-boomer, my formative experiences saw colours and culture imposed top-down along with a new commercialism. The 60s suburban lifestyle saw everything new, bright and sterile as modern. Vintage colours, linked to musty indoors and antiques, were rejected except in the most traditional circles.
This post-war, post-recession attitude was central in the era of Mad Men (Madison Avenue) advertising. Marketing came a skilled craft, relying on new media options, expanded production scale, and psychological theories which included subliminal messaging. The fascinating, benign notion of colour symbolism was overlaid with suspicion about manipulative marketing and the use of colour as an instrument for driving excess.
A Cultural Evolution: Silent Spring to denim
A counter-culture shift occurred in the early 1960s. Its origins were multi-faceted but marked by Rachel Carson’s book Silent Spring (1962) which led a new ecological awareness. Primary colours were less evident in all things stylistic and household except for the most modern, trademark producers. Instead, natural fibres and décor became popular; the outdoors was often brought inside with indoor plant use and macramé art introducing an early variant of the Fresh Indoors style.
The demographics now seemed to be driving a bottom-up cultural movement, but the Madison Avenue players took note and chose to evolve. Clever manufacturing choices were soon made to build upon the popularity of jeans and T-shirts as a new uniform: as a badge of war counter-culture and (ironically) anti-consumerism. Read More soon on The Denim Revolution.
