colour play

Last week we had a fun workshop with Phillipa Wagner, all about exploring colour. I found her theory on 'natural palettes' (the idea that we all have colours we are comfortable working with, and naturally gravitate towards) really interesting- and quite a useful thing to consciously understand, as a designer! Plus, it was a great way to get excited about the idea of arranging colours, considering our current project brief.

We were instructed to grab 6-8 objects the bring along to the workshop, and then worked in groups of 3 to arrange our collective chosen objects into a 'colour matrix'. It's useful to see colour spread in this way, in order to recognise the balance of the colour you're working with. Funnily enough, in our group, the colour range was perfectly proportioned- Heather had bought all neutral, natural coloured objects, Lisa's were all light and white coloured, and my objects were all bright colours! So our matrix covered all the bases:

Then we composed a set of different colour palettes using our collection of colours from the matrix. I loved doing this as a group - we took it in turns to each add a colour to the palette, discussing how it would change the overall effect in combination with the other colours that were being added. It was fascinating to share our different approaches to colour as a group! 

Here were our palettes. First up we made a mini collection of the objects we wanted to dicate the colours for each palette...then, we searched for fabric swatches to translate the palette into a textile story:

 set of objects, then swatches for our second palette:

 3rd collection/palette:

 Our final group palette. For this one, Philippa challenged us to work with a gradiating move of colour across the palette, as all our previous combinations had a good spread of lights/brights/darks. So here, we went for a neutral flow:

This has definitely made me think about my own attitude to colour...and how my own attraction to brights generally seems to channel it's way into my design work, somehow or other! 

Finally we made up our natural palettes derived from the objects/colours we'd intuitively selected for the workshops as individuals. Here's mine:

And actually, these colours are similar/connected to my project colours right now- the orange, plummy pinks/raspberry, and the bright green. What a co-incidence....!

Now it'll be fun to carry this experimental palette creating approach through to my work. I also like the idea of using objects to original represent/derive colour from. This could be carried further through the design process, and the objects could perhaps feature in the designs somehow themselves? Let's see- it's all to play around with!