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| "Composition in Red, White and Yellow," Piet Mondrian, 1936 Courtesy of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art - www.lacma.org |
Hello friends,
One day years ago when I was playing tourist in Los Angeles County I encountered a kiosk that claimed the ability to photograph my aura if I would simply be willing to put my fingers in a machine. Then, using the print out (mine to keep), the employee operating the kiosk would be able to prescribe the right color therapy products. First, the friend with whom I was walking tried it out. Her photograph came out a rainbow of swirling colors all around her, with a light blue swoosh over her head, and lots of lovely yellows and aquas and greens and purples.
Then I went. All red. Just one giant red blob engulfing my upper body. The lady manning the kiosk said she'd never seen anything like it. The colors in the aura photographs were supposed to correspond to the well being and balance of my chakras, and this meant I was all root chakra and nothing else. Clearly I needed to surround myself with literally all the other colors to balance myself out. Feeling as though I couldn't just take the photograph and go without buying something, I picked out a yellow candle and a blue candle consistent with her advice (and because I liked how they smelled) and went about my way.
But it stuck with me, the image of my big red blob. I haven't seen the photograph in years. I'm pretty sure it was a casualty of the great scrapbook purge of 2007. Even if there is a such thing as chakras and auric fields, I highly doubt that some company trying to sell me candles can really capture a photograph of my aura just from having me stick my finger in a machine for five seconds. Nonetheless, I seem to frequently recall that I am red (A philosopher of sandwiches?). And blobby.
The fact that the thought has stuck with me for so many years, despite my skepticism and the loss of the photograph, shows just what a memorable impact color and color associations can have on us. The notion that our colors need to be in balance may induce skepticism from many when it comes to New Age ideas like chakra healing, but as a foundational concept in art, decor, fashion and marketing it goes unquestioned by the mainstream. We know when we look at certain colors, and more than that certain combinations of colors, we react at a gut level. Some remind us of the calm of the sea and summer evenings and fill us with nostalgia. Some make us happy. Some lull us to sleep. And others are a call to action, or even evoke anger.
I therefore try to be cognizant of the ways that I use color in my everyday life, whether I'm putting on an outfit that I hope will express my mood or hopes for the day, putting together a table spread for dinner guests, or diving into a cozy knitting project at the end of the day.
Here are some of the easy ways that I have found to play with color:
First, Design Seeds. Design Seeds Design Seeds Design Seeds. The concept is so simple, and yet so perfect. Jessica Colaluca takes a single inspiration image and then pulls out various tones to form a delectable palette for use in decor, crafting, outfit selection, you name it. Somehow the image + palette formula results in the perfect little inspirational nugget in a way that neither element on its own could ever achieve. But it doesn't require anything more. Elegant.
I can envision myself knitting that last one already; translating this image and palette into a knitted piece by selecting just the right fibers seems like a delectable challenge. In fact, my angora Pueblo Shawl doesn't seem that far off:
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| Available at coupcoup.etsy.com |
In a similar vein to Design Seeds, the Instagram account Color Consumption also pulls colors from an original inspiration, but whereas Design Seeds derives inspiration from an image Color Consumption uses intangible concepts - and even personalities - for inspiration. While Design Seeds dives into the detail of every image to deliver a multifaceted, wide ranging palette, Color Consumption reduces and/or deconstructs its inspiration into two colors only, one large and one small.
Iiiii...don't completely know what to make of it. But it's cool! And, naturally, one of the account's Instagram posts referenced IKB, or International Klein Blue, which I learned about in a college course on Buddhism and art. Klein patented the color after working with a chemist to create it. That, of course, then reminded me of this article about Harvard's pigment library, which apparently preserves the world's rarest colors.
Next, I want to introduce you to a book I absolutely swear by, Life in Color: the Visual Guide to the Perfect Palette - for Fashion, Beauty and You!
This one I ran into on the sale rack at the back of my favorite bookstore in Boston and I don't remember what compelled me to pick it up. Maybe the fact that it was so cheap, or maybe the ridiculously long title that is really three titles, I don't know. But I love it and show it to my friends. It does an amazing job of helping you figure out what colors are most flattering on you, but it does so much more than that.
One, it has tearaway color palettes you can take shopping with you, and those palettes are comprised of stickers.
Two, it has two quizzes, one that helps you figure out your color type and one that helps you figure out your style type out of five general categories (whimsical, boho, classic, chic and avant garde). Obviously it doesn't recommend using these things as hard and fast rules, and I don't, but it's actually helpful to have a sense of what it is you tend to go for, if for nothing else than using the right search terms for online shopping or describing what you like to other people.
Three, and perhaps most important, it's racially inclusive. The book upends the conventional "season" method, in which all Women of Color are basically Winters by default, and provides its own system wherein it is underlying skin tone and not race or how dark your skin is that determines what colors you should be wearing. It then provides super helpful photos of women of several different races in each color type modeling the colors that do and don't work for them.
It also provides examples of each of the four color types combined with each of the five style types, as well as helpful tips for makeup, what neutrals to wear, and what to do if your favorite colors don't fall on the palette that's most flattering to you.
I could go on.
How about you readers? Where do you get your color inspiration from? How do you use color to create the mood you hope to evoke? Do you believe that it is necessary to achieve a color balance in life and, if so, how do you achieve it? Discuss in the comments.
Emily
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