Color Influential

Drum roll please…Pantone, the color experts, have announced their color of the year. Actually, for the first time ever, they have chosen not one…but two colors: soft pastels that complement each other. The colors of 2016 are a delicate rose quartz and serenity and ethereal blue – hues that reflect the current “gender blur.” Who knew that Caitlyn Jenner could influence the color of curtains?
Color influences everything in our worlds from fashion and interior design to even housewares such as espresso makers and toasters. And the world influences the colors that dominate our environment. We talked to executive director of the Pantone Color Institute, Leatrice Eiseman, who explained that the company looks for “strong indicators” to assess the colors of the moment. “There’s a lot of homework; we don’t just sit around and divine the colors.”

While traveling the world, Eiseman and her team look for influences in both fine art (think: Korea’s Samsung Museum or Art) and pop culture – such sources as animated children’s films and concept cars. And when colors emerge, they do so all at once. While visiting London’s Tate Modern, she noticed that painter Agnes Martin was using the two colors Eiseman was already considering as the colors of 2016. Along the way she also noticed “a renewed interest in the Impressionists,” known for their soft coloration.

While 2016 features “lighter pastels,” they’re not to be confused with the sort of brightish hues of “Necco Wafers,” she says. “These are nuanced colors, toned down, airy.” Two colors were chosen because their “inherent balance of warm and cool was important to our message: a harmonious pairing of inviting shades that embody a mindset of tranquility and inner peace.” Surely what the world needs now.

Interior Design
“The obvious place to use blue accented with rose is in the bedroom,” according to Eiseman. Such hues are “soft and embracing, and provide a calming atmosphere.” She also envisions using them in a room that “doesn’t get a lot of sunlight, that you want to warm up.” The colors are showing up in patterns, such as Indian paisleys where they are often combined with a “gorgeous Dijon mustard shade.”

But it seems that the Hamptons’ design world goes its own way. Bernt Heiberg for one, partner in Sag Harbor’s Heiberg Cummings Design, decidedly doesn’t follow color trends. In fact, he uses very little color, preferring to work with light grays and shaded whites, in products such as paints from Farrow and Ball. “I was brought up in Norway, which is not that colorful.” Non-colors “last longer,” he says. “I don’t want people to get tired of my red living room.” It’s not surprising then, that he and his partner, Bill Cummings, penned a book called “White Light,” which underscores their belief in the lack of color. “I use color as a contrast,” he says. “A little touch of orange or umber, I don’t believe in bright colors.” That aesthetic translates into his sartorial style. “I dress in white, even in winter. White makes me happy.”

At Fishers Home Furnishings in Sag Harbor merchandise buyer Jennifer Jiras says: “Gray has been really strong for us.” Not solid gray, but a “washed” version, often painted on furniture or fabric and rubbed off. As for the “new” rose color: “We’ve always had rose quartz.” It works well with their “beachy” colored bed linens, throw pillows and other accessories.
Gray, agrees Elizabeth Dow, principal of the eponymous East Hampton store and design firm, is her “personal go to as it’s the perfect background for color in any form, whether artwork or pillows.” Its mercurial nature enables it to “lean toward cool or warm.” In a nod to Pantone, she adds: “Pink is the new orange.”

Fashion
The Pantone color duo were seen on runways in the collections of such couture houses as Chanel, Prada and Fendi. Valentino showed pale pink athletic-inspired shoes for men with a band of serenity blue. Eiseman says the colors will even be showing up in jewelry and makeup.
Veteran color researcher and Napeague resident Vilislava Petrova believes that as we navigate between the opposites of “technology and the need to connect to the natural, we are equally attracted to the bold bright shades coming out of our screens and the real colors of plants.” A recent fashion trend of “combining neon shades with subdued, earthy color” is a clear example of this.

Beauty
The dark smoky eyes and bold lips of winter are “fading into soft pastels for spring,” says Diana Ross, executive store director of White’s Apothecary in East Hampton and Southampton. Look for “soft, shimmery hues with textures that are creamy and gel-like.” Sound familiar? “No one does this look better than Bobbi Brown,” she says, noting that Brown’s spring “Glow Collection” features such colors as heather and pink.

Art
“I find myself using blue a lot,” says Sag Harbor painter, Roy Nicholson, who used to teach color theory at Southampton College. In his work he aims to capture the emotions evoked by color – from light-hearted to dark and mysterious. He made a series of paintings in which the “gloaming” dictated the mood. During twilight, “when the light is fading, color intensifies and is moodier.” The artist, who uses his garden as a starting point, orchestrates the interactions of colors. “I think of myself as tuning color like you would an instrument.”

Spirituality
Montauk yoga therapist and Reiki practitioner Catherine McGuire uses color as a tool in her energy work. “Each chakra has a color related to it,” she says, explaining that colors contain vibrations. (She also works with sound.) “If someone is not well rooted in life, I’ll bring the color red into their awareness while they focus on their root chakra.” The sacral chakra, she says, is orange and relates to creativity. “It’s sexual but also about the birthing of ideas.” She might have a client suffering from writer’s block “bring something orange into their work.”