Expect to see it on all of next season’s clothes. Popping up on posters and vases and rugs. Adorning billboards and hogging the attention on TV. That’s right: Pantone’s ‘colour of the year’ has been announced.
And the winner? Very Peri, a light purple-blue. Explaining the decision, the colour kings at Pantone said it combines the ‘constancy’ of traditional blue with the ‘energy and excitement’ of red. The shade’s full name is Pantone 17-3938, in case you need the exact details. It wasn’t actually in the Pantone catalogue yet, so the company blended existing colours to create it.
The shade is inspired by nature – think lavender fields and beautiful bird plumage – and also the ‘digital landscape’, apparently. The brand reckons that ‘as we emerge from an intense period of isolation, our notions and standards are changing, and our physical and digital lives have merged in new ways’. Sounds kind of true, we guess?
Pantone’s experts comb through social media and fashion and art trends to pick their colour of the year. The competition has been going for 23 years, with previous winners including Tangerine Tango, Aqua Sky and Fuchsia Rose. Last year they picked Ultimate Grey and Illuminating (a shade of yellow, basically).
But in any case, the main question we have is whether this year’s winner is actually blue or purple. Lavender, perhaps? What do you think?