Pantone’s Color Of The Year 2018 Is ‘Ultra Violet’: Why Purple Is Hip Again
The 2018 Pantone Color of the Year is Ultra Violet, bringing images of Jimi Hendrix singing “Purple Haze,” magical crystals, and the cosmos. Does this mean 2018 will usher in a period of transformation?
Pantone has been selecting the Color of the Year since 1999, and after 19 years, they know what they are doing.
Pantone claims that they don’t look into a crystal ball for each color of the year. Instead, they are looking for general lifestyle and new color trends, and which color stands out from the past year. This color is Ultra Violet.
Pantone believes that color has a message to reflect a moment of time and that the emotional aspect of color they select is so important. This is why the 2018 Pantone Color of the Year is number 18-3838, Ultra Violet, a blue-infused purple.
Purple is a mixture of calm blue with energetic red that creates its own special kind of mystical energy. As there is more blue than red in Ultra Violet, the calm prevails.
According to Pantone Vice President Laurie Pressman, who spoke to the Associated Press, Ultra Violet is about mindfulness.
“It’s often associated with mindfulness practices, so it has that spiritual or mystical quality that’s attached — a little bit of magic that’s inferred in the color.”
Purple-toned lighting has always inspired meditation and creativity. Leonardo da Vinci believed that mediation in purple light through a stained glass window was improved by a factor of 10. The composer Wagner “surrounded himself with purple” when he composed.
Purple is the color for exploring new technologies or spiritual reflections. Ultra Violet is about the magical, the mystical, and psychic ability. Many mystics and healers use purple. For years, purple quartz crystals were symbolic of peace of mind. In interior design, purple lights are often used for the shower or bath to calm and relax.
Pantone channeled Prince and space for 2018’s color of the year https://t.co/qv2usDqATa pic.twitter.com/lVUlTkGYR0
— VANITY FAIR (@VanityFair) December 7, 2017
Beyond fashion and design, purple-toned food has now become popular, including purple potatoes, cauliflower, and purple asparagus.
What has led us down this path to a purple haze?
As Inquisitr previously reported, in 2017, the Color of the Year has been a vivid, yellow-green color called Greenery. That represented a connection with nature, new beginnings, expressing personal passions and a having a larger purpose.
Ultra Violet goes a step further into transformation. This purple shade is “provocative and thoughtful,” and Pressman points out that Ultra Violet “communicates originality, ingenuity, and visionary thinking.”
Pantone’s Color of the Year for 2018 Is ‘A Reflection of What’s Needed in Our World Today’ https://t.co/1Ts4iXPvJ1
— People (@people) December 7, 2017
It is no surprise then that Greenery looks beautiful with Ultra Violet, working in harmony together.
Although Pantone is focused on fashion and interior design, they are also interested in the social aspects of color.
Perhaps the most significant emotional aspect of purple is the symbol of the Counterculture movement. Purple was used for the suffragettes nearly a century ago. As House Beautiful points out, “It’s worth noting that purple has a tendency to come into vogue at important turning points in history, and that turbulent times are often, in their turn, crucibles for artistic expression.”
They even gave some examples of the influence of the “complicated, contemplative shade of purple.”
“Purple was a favorite color of the Fauvists in the revolutionary first decade of the twentieth century, and had a heyday with musical artists like Jimi Hendrix in the late 60s and early 70s, at the apex of the Countercultural movement.”
It is no surprise that Prince played his revolutionary music clad in purple, often playing a purple guitar. Grace Jones often wore purple, as did David Bowie. Artist Keith Haring used purple often in his work. The revolutionary Pre-Raphaelite painters often used purple in their works.
Founded in 1962, Pantone has been the authority on color. From the beginning, Pantone has been creating color systems, determining color trends, and even making over classic children’s book covers. As for predicting the Minnesota Vikings winning the Super Bowl, the purple-clad team may look to Ultra Violet as a good omen for their quest to play and win the Super Bowl on their home turf.
