Cool’s the coolest colors for 2009 decorating

Published 8:57 am Thursday, November 13, 2008

Color palettes in home fashion are always changing, like a kaleidoscope that never stops moving.

It’s often hard to keep up.

In our search for color cues, we turned to the nation’s top two color-forecasting organizations — the Color Marketing Group, a Virginia-based association, and the Pantone Color Institute, part of the New Jersey-based company, Pantone — to provide highlights from their influential forecasts.

Here’s a look at three hot color trends, heavily influenced by the economy and ecology, to watch for in the interiors realm now and into 2009.

Posh purple

Purple? Yes, purple.

While pale hues such as lavender and lilac have been going strong as secondary hues in home decorating for years now, nouveau purples pack a punch.

Indigo. Plum. Violet. Grape. Iris. Aubergine.

Bleeding quickly from runway fashion and into home interiors, these purples are dripping with raspberry and blackberry, blushed with touches of fuchsia, and sometimes hints of shiraz, pomegranate and kumquat.

Often associated with royalty and religious orders, purple is the ultimate statement color.

“Deep plums are very grand and opulent feeling, and very rich,” said Mark Woodman, an interior designer, color expert and a board member with the Color Marketing Group. “It has kind of an aura of poshness to it. People love the reaction to it.”

Check out Benjamin Moore’s Summer Plum paint, a rich, ruddy purple, not far off from the limited-edition Purple Cut color found in the high-end accessory line from Vipp.

This year, the Danish company’s Purple Cut products, released in January, have outsold all other limited-edition Vipp colors, including previous years’ Python Green and Reykjavik Blue.

“Usually, people say, ‘I love that color.’ And then they’ll buy a white one,” said Vipp co-owner Kasper Egelund. “They will be conservative.”

That hasn’t happened with the Purple Cut.

“Purple is the kind of color that will fit beautifully into a room that just needs a little spice,” Egelund said.

Go gray, or not

Heavily influenced by the increasing ubiquity of stainless steel kitchen appliances, gray is making its way onto walls and upholstery in three major ways, according to the Color Marketing Group.

First, there are all-out grays with undertones of no other color. Second, there are grays with silver and blue undertones. Finally, there are sophisticated, green-cast smoky grays.

Gray is an attractive color for people living in uncertain times, Woodman said. People who want to play their design cards conservatively, especially on big-ticket items, often drift to neutrals.

“Gray is safety,” Woodman said. “It’s a little noncommittal because it floats in the middle. It’s an equalizer.”

Gray, Woodman said, is not necessarily boring. It’s a hue that’s setting itself up to work well with many other emerging color trends.

“One I’m watching out for is an outgrowth from the plums and purples,” Woodman said. “We haven’t seen gray and burgundy in almost 20 years.”

Indeed, Pantone’s 2009 color forecast for home interiors includes all sorts of gray-­influenced tones (ash, Gray Ridge, silver) as well as many mauves (Misty Rose, Rose Wine, Opera Mauve).

It could be a 1980s “mauving of America” all over again, except reinvented and hip, Woodman said.

Woodman’s favorite foil for gray as of late, however, is what he calls a “retina-burning yellow,” which adds an “incredible pop.”

Northwest residents in particular may need that extra oomph.

Leatrice Eiseman, the executive director of the Pantone Color Institute and a professional color consultant, cautions against using too much gray for people living in rainy pockets of the Northwest.

“My recommendation for people who really do find themselves suffering from a little seasonal affective disorder, is to use warmer colors, like yellow, on the walls,” said Eiseman, who lives on Bainbridge Island.

Mellow blues, greens

In the coming year, consumers will also start to see a mellowing of the green and blue palettes that have become so popular in recent years.

Woodman expects the shift, tied closely to the eco-friendly and natural-living movement, to bring out more organic and natural tones.

“It’s more, I think, about deep-forest greens, hostas that grow in the shade,” he said. “It’s much cooler.”

Home appliances, which once wore energetic with bright blues, reds and greens, have dulled. Take, for example, Samsung’s front-loading washer and dryer combo in a softer blue, definitely a hue infused with gray.

Benjamin Moore’s Sidewalk Gray and Summer Shower colors are grayish blues. The paint company’s Passion Blue is like the sky, but with a touch of, you guessed it, gray. Its Shaker Gray is like slate, but somehow still vibrant.

Green, one of the most-used colors of the last few years, in part due to the popularity of eco-friendly trends, is moving away from yellow-based shades and toward blue-based hues, according to the Color Marketing Group.

If it all sounds just too dreary to you, take Eiseman’s wise advice: Do what pleases you.

Put your own taste, your own favorite colors first.

“The best thing about trends is they are an instant way of bringing in a fresh new look, but if you look at that, and you say, ‘I really don’t like that color. That doesn’t speak to me,’ then don’t do it,” she said. “Homes should always be an expression of who you are.”

Sarah Jackson: 425-339-3037 or sjackson@heraldnet.com.