Colors of the Year 2021

Color drives so much of our mood and attitude within our surroundings. It can dictate what we wear, as well as the colors in our home…and pretty much everything we take in from the world around us.

Every year Pantone flips a switch and drives the color trend for everything we see in the coming year. For over 20 years, Pantone’s Color of the Year has influenced much of what you see in the commercial world from product development to products found in fashion, home furnishings, and industrial design; even product packaging and graphic design reflect these choices.

Some years the paint manufacturers have a close interpretation and sometimes they take the road less traveled. While we love Pantone’s optimism this year it feels to us like a slightly contrived nod to hope and comfort. What do you think?

Pantone blessed Illuminating (a sunny yellow) and Ultimate Gray (your sweatpants circa 1990) as their color combination for 2021. While they are a timeless complement to each other we think the chance of versions of it taking hold in home design to be slim for most so we will go with our paint manufacturer of choice, Benjamin Moore’s, color of the year. They chose Aegean Teal, a very livable color that has a calming effect. Like Pantone’s Illuminating yellow hue this too feels optimistic yet grounding. Reminiscent of Martha Stewart’s famous egg colors of the 90’s, but pumped up to not feel too country, yet familiar. It is a warm mid-tone that includes blue, green and hint gray that we can see applications of from kitchen islands to front doors, window shutters and incorporated into tile and cabinet colors. We look forward to see where it takes us in the year to come!