Pick a color. What’s your fav? Do you HAVE a favorite color? I was asked the other day that very question and I was really at a loss…I looked at her, furrowed my brow and cocked my head. I wanted to have an answer – a simple answer that stated a definitive preference for a color – my most favorite. Rather than producing a quick sure pick, I faltered as she stepped in and said – I’ll bet it’s purple!
Well, actually I can definitively say that purple is NOT my favorite color, but the funny thing is I can love purple, in certain context. The real answer is that I love nearly any color in a certain context.
When I ponder the question a bit more, I can assertively say bright pinks, cornflower blues, golden yellows, chartreuse and brilliant orange. But the truth is, I love so many colors that I am hard-pressed to select just one! It sounds like a Lilly Pulitzer color board.
So I thought of a little exercise. I decided to pick a color at random. Then overwhelmed with the myriad colors that might produce one random pick, I fine-tuned random and said to myself, perhaps a color of the season. To me that was currently and boldly orange. So the idea was that I would walk in and around my house today and capture things that were orange.
This screaming orange hibiscus just came in from the patio to escape the chilling temperatures that have swept down in the last couple of days…happy to transition indoors for the winter!
Try it. Pick a color – not necessarily your favorite – but certainly one you like and walk inside and outside of your house and see how many examples you can find, of that color, in your immediate world. Photograph things that have that color – all or in part, even little details – anyplace that color occurs. It’s fun and very interesting to see what you discover!!
Autumn is loaded with vibrant colors, but orange is one of the most fiery.
So I selected orange as my color today. I dashed around the house and collected a variety of things that were orange. I was actually astonished at how many I discovered.
This dramatic Hopi – influenced kachina by Gregory Lomayesva sports stylized antlers in a flat but brilliant orange.
Festive ceramics by Ann Marie Werner Smith – here a graceful orange bowl that sits on the counter…it pops against the contrasting granite.
It is interesting because I know my world is not heavily orange, but I found so many wonderful splashes of it throughout my interior and even startling exterior, in the way of the leaves on the Bradford Pear tree.
From fresh mini pumpkins and flowers…
A succulent orange flowering Kalanchoe is our seasonal centerpiece on the kitchen table.
A variegated Croton plant has lacy veining of bright orange, pink and yellow contrasted against it dark green background.
to artwork with swaths of orange streaking through them.
A lovely little oil painting by Jeff Otis depicts a very autumnal New Mexico river scene.
At the last minute, while waiting in the Bejing airport, I found this precious little painting of birds and berries. The background is a vibrant orange. Notice the fresh blues adjacent to the orange. This is a detail of the much larger piece.
Peggy Zuris really knew color. Her bold and confident brush strokes applied in luscious swaths placed adjacent colors perfectly juxtaposed creating uplifting renditions of daily life. This little chicken is a detail of a fanciful rural scene.
The balance of color was so interesting. Where I found orange, I nearly always found blue – unless it was a stand-alone like the glass bowl of oranges – or my coral necklace with its nuggets of bright orange coral.
Fresh oranges with their intricately textured rinds fill a glass bowl on the kitchen counter.
Nuggets of coral look like candy corn tightly beaded on this delicious necklace I wore too Santa Fe today!!
Colors balance and contrast.
Even the coasters that attracted my attention last weekend at a bar. I was so taken by them that I brought them home and had them sitting on the kitchen counter. They were intriguing and offered interest and visual stimulation to my graphic art sensibilities.
I began this story earlier today, then took a break and tootled up to Santa Fe where I came across a couple more bright orange pieces…
And on the way home, I was even blinded by an orange fireball glowing beneath the stormy sky silhouetting the dark mesas and glistening off the wet pavement. It’s intense heat contrasting with the cold, damp asphalt that was a result of our first seasonal snow seen here spitting at the windshield.
Gather your collection of photos of your color today. Ponder how they and the color make you feel. Do you get joy from the color and the things you have discovered? Was this not your thought-to-be favorite color and if not, might it be one of them? How do YOU answer the question, what is your favorite color and having determined that, ask yourself: Do I wear it a lot? Would I paint my walls that color? Do I have upholstery that color? When is a favorite color an accent? Is the joy in the little spots of punctuation? Are they intense, but small, elements of joy without over-doing it? I see a collection of abstract images, details of things – some of which can be cropped more – to create an abstract collage of wall art. Voila!
Color – an amazing facet of design and it’s most versatile component. It’s been a fun test and a compelling story. So what’s YOUR favorite color?
