Category: Colour Theory

Studies in colour for the purpose of defining a personal style

Pink & Green

January 25, 2017

Pink is cotton candy. Green is a cool, spring breeze. Pink is a day at the fair. Green is a long hike in the woods. Pink is realizing you can rock a “girly” colour and still be a bad-ass feminist. Green is taking a long bath and listening to a favourite podcast, forgetting all the bullshit misogyny you had to deal with that day because you just need a moment for self-care. Pink and green together are fresh and lovely, bold if jewel tones and crisp if pastels.

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Pink and Green are great friends. They hold hands in public places and hang out at the pond, watching the ducks but not feeding them because that would be environmentally unwoke. Pink is happy to be whitened red, allowing itself to work alongside Green in a way red cannot simply because Christmas has appropriated that particular colour scheme (just like Christians appropriated Yule, amiright?!). Green acknowledge’s Pink’s sacrifice, but appreciates that it’s not really a sacrifice at all because Pink is fierce in its own right.

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Green tries to extend their day’s adventures into the night, and invites Pink over for Netflix and chill, where chill really does mean chill. But with a wink and a sassy hand wave, Pink is like, bitch please, I got places to be. Pink is up for a night of partying, but Green just wants to slip into its cozy slippers and enjoy a glass of wine. They are both happy to compromise and they enjoy a leisurely dinner at a local hot spot where Pink can be seen and Green can people-watch. Then Pink goes clubbing with Black and Electric Blue while Green retires for the evening and binge-watches nature documentaries until it falls asleep in Orange’s loving arms.

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Black & Pink

January 18, 2017

Perhaps it is appropriate that pink is currently considered a feminine colour. I have examined the colour quite closely now, in my studies for this post, and I’ve determined that it is an exceedingly strong colour. Yes, pink is pastel red. Watered down red. Whitewashed red. But red is the strongest colour on the spectrum. Pastel red is like a secret. Pink is hiding in plain sight. Pink is a woman who paints on her face everyday in order to take on the patriarchy without being noticed. She will infiltrate slowly, and subtly, and then, when you least expect it she will pair that pink with black and fucking take over the world.

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Black is infinitely powerful. Unflappable. Black is in charge and doesn’t care about your rules, and yet black follows the rules because black IS the rules. With black’s take charge attitude and pink’s flirtatious infiltration, they will tear a man down. Together, black and pink have truly run out of fucks to give.

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Challenge pink and black if you dare. Go ahead and try. You see Pinky Pie up there, taking on Darth Vader? You think Vader will win because he has a light sabre. But you are a fool, because unless you’ve watched My Little Pony, Friendship is Magic you don’t realise that Pinky Pie is THE most powerful creature in all the universes. Just watch this long-ass video about Deadpool vs. Pinkie Pie if you’re unconvinced. Pinkie Pie will win this battle, except Darth Vader will win too, because Pinkie Pie won’t fight him, she will befriend him and he, and the entire Galactic Empire, will be helpless to resist. Pinkie Pie is THAT powerful. She will take all her pink splendour and combine it with Vader’s black bad-assery and they will dance off into the sunset singing songs about friendship. Take my word for it, black and pink will fuck you up.

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Black & White

January 11, 2017

Before colour photography was invented, we were limited to capturing the world in black and white (aside from paintings, which can only ever be interpretation). Perhaps this is why traditional views are also black and white. The real world functions in shades of grey, with no right or wrong, only a variance of opinion. But sometimes stripping an image of colour can add a certain clarity. Viewing pictures in black and white forces contrast, allowing otherwise obscured details to emerge.

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Black and white are complete opposites, both neutrals but in utter contrast to one another, why is why they work so well together. A black and white outfit conveys strength, order, conviction, but also whimsy if deployed in equal measure. In creating this post I put together the outfit you see above and I find that I quite like it. Usually, in my real life, my outfits are dominated by colour, but now that I’ve challenged myself to put together something based on such contrast I can see no reason not to wear it for realsies.

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There is also something soothing about the contrast between black and white. I discovered this as I was putting together my colour boards for this post. I find the above montage rather mesmerizing. Moody, perhaps even creepy, but pleasingly so. Perhaps it is the purity of white mixing with the power of black. Both colours, or neutrals if you prefer, are as stark as can be and together they create something graphic and geometric even when the shapes conveyed are organic in nature. I find myself hard pressed to think of any other configuration of colour that will be so aesthetically pleasing.

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There is a celebrity, Janelle Monae, whose aesthetic is almost exclusively black&white and she rocks it. Perhaps we should all take a page from her book.