Will Pantone’s optimistic choice for Colour of the Year cheer us all up in 2019?
‘Life affirming’ Living Coral is a reflection of ‘what’s needed in our world today’, say trend forecasters and colour experts at Pantone
Citing consumers’ desire for real human connections amid an increasingly negative social media landscape, the trend forecasters and colour experts at Pantone have selected Living Coral, a “life-affirming” and “nurturing” shade, as 2019’s colour of the year. The announcement was made at Art Basel Miami Beach last week.
“With everything that’s going on today, we’re looking for those humanising qualities because we’re seeing online life dehumanising a lot of things,” Laurie Pressman, the Pantone Color Institute’s vice-president, told the Associated Press. “We’re looking toward those colours that bring nourishment and the comfort and familiarity that make us feel good.”
Pantone has been analysing cultural trends since 2000 to predict what colour will be ubiquitous in the art, fashion and design worlds in the coming year. The company has hinted that it’s hoping to influence society, too.
“The Pantone Colour of the Year has come to mean so much more than ‘what’s trending’ in the world of design; it’s truly a reflection of what’s needed in our world today,” Pressman said last year.
Last December, the company selected Ultra Violet, a “dramatically provocative and thoughtful purple shade” – inspired by Prince and reminiscent of grape soda – as its colour of the year for 2018.
A company executive noted at the time that the colour combined blue and red, “two shades that are seemingly diametrically opposed”.
For some, the announcement read as a coded call for bipartisanship in a period of political polarisation in the United States.