Welcome to the life-enhancing world of colour

Colour. We’re surrounded by it every day of our lives and probably because of that fact most people just take it for granted. Or they follow what every fashion house, interior designer, paint manufacturer and social media influencer tells them is the “in” colour for the year or just the season.

You are expected to follow their trends and rush out to buy everything in that colour, but will it suit your individual personality or your home environment?

Do you want to wear the same colours as everyone else and live in the same colour environment? Or do you want to be you!?

Clever use of colours and shades in everything from the clothes you wear to your home surroundings will enhance your moods, boost your energy and enrich your life. But this can only happen when you understand the effects that colour has on you.

Everyone knows what colour red, blue, green, yellow, orange, brown and grey are. They might even split it into dark blue and light blue, or realise that light red is pink, but that is often all they think about in terms of colour.

Yet colour can have such powerful impact on us, our mood, and our environment that we are missing such an important tool for transforming our lives if we ignore it.

Do you ever stop and think about which colours you are drawn to and why? Or how you feel when you are wearing certain colours?

The answers can tell you so much about yourself and the environment that best suits you and in which you will feel most comfortable, confident and creative. Once you know those answers you can easily take control of enhancing every aspect of your life. But how do you find those answers?

All too often people are swayed by the latest fashion colour of the year whether it’s in the clothes that they buy or the colours they paint their walls, cover their sofas with or drape over their beds. Don’t do it! That’s emperor’s new clothes syndrome and the death-knell of individualism.

Not only will the same colour not suit everyone, but do we really want a one-colour world?

A few years ago it was difficult to find any paint, paper, furniture or furnishings that were not grey. Grey!!! Think about going outside and looking up at the sky and tell me which appeals to you more: a bright blue, sunny sky or a grey, leaden one about to unleash a downpour on you? I know which I prefer.

Seriously, though, which colours do you prefer? I don’t mean which colours have the celebrity influencers on social media told you that you should be surrounding yourself with, but which colours really appeal to you?

Part One: Discovering what colours appeal to you - and which ones don’t! – and why

Look around you now

Stop what you are doing right now and look around you. Find the colour or colours that are most appealing to you.

What is it about each of them that is appealing? Really think hard about why you are drawn to those colours from all the mass of colours surrounding you at this point in time.

Go to your workbook and on page 5 jot down where you were and when and list at least two or three colours that you are drawn to, adding in a note about the form/product in which you saw them. For each colour try and pinpoint the reasons why they appeal to you and what emotional or energetic effect they have on you. Try to be as accurate as possible about describing the exact shade of each colour.

Please note that if you are uncertain about describing colours or identifying shades, you may want to work through “Part Two: The Colour Wheel” before completing these exercises in your workbook.

What colours don’t you like?

It is just as important to know which colours do not enhance your mood and your sense of well-being. Therefore, repeat the exercise looking around you for the colours that are least appealing.

What is it about each of them that fails to appeal? What is your emotional response to them? Once again, really think hard about why you are not drawn to those colours from all the mass of colours surrounding you at this point in time.

Go back to your workbook and write down detailed notes on at least two colours that you were not very keen on. For each of them try and pinpoint the reasons why and their effect.

What colours am I missing?

Try to be as accurate as possible about describing the exact shade of each colour, where you saw it and what you felt about it.

For example, you may have spotted the colour yellow . . . yes, that’s one of my favourite colours so I would choose that one!

What is it about the colour that appealed to you? Where did you see the colour? It could be you saw it in a bunch or bouquet of flowers and it reminded you of the joy of being out in nature instead of the concrete jungle surrounding you? Or maybe it was a glass of orange juice and it symbolised the sunshine that you are missing on a grey, wet day? Or it conjured up images of swathes of daffodils proclaiming to the world that winter has finally gone, spring is here and summer sunshine is on its way?

For some people yellow is akin to gold so it stands for the riches they want in life. Or maybe it simply energises them because it is a happy colour?

Maybe yellow doesn’t appeal to you? I still remember someone telling me once that she didn’t like yellow because it reminded her of patients she had nursed with jaundice. The phrase “having a jaundiced view of life” came to mind! Yellow has also been associated with bitterness and envy so it’s not always sunshine and sunflowers.

Of course there are also many shades and tones that would come under the broad heading of “yellow” from the palest lemon through the sunshine yellows, into golds and then onto the darker mustard shades.

Describing the exact shade of the colours

When you have worked out what colours you can see around you on this first occasion that you like or don’t like, repeat the exercise on other days in other environments or locations and see how they match up.

Note: There are 3 pages in your workbook to carry out this exercise in different locations on different days.

Are they the same sort of colours? If they are a different range is that because of how you were feeling at the time you did the experiment or the more practical reason of your favourite colours from day 1 not appearing in your location in days 2, 3 and so on?

The latter comment is not a flippant remark, it is a serious question to ask yourself: Am I missing X colour in my life?

After you have done the “which colours am I drawn to” experiment a few times you will know which ones appeal. On Page 7 of your workbook you can list your top 5 favourite colours followed by your 5 least favourite colours.

How often do your favourite colours appear?

With your list to hand, look at the colours in your own environment, especially your wardrobe choices and your home decor.

Don’t forget to do the other half of the experiment and see how often and where your least appealing colours turn up in your daily life.

Any colour that you are drawn to that creates a positive response in you should be echoed around all aspects of your life: everything from what you wear (including make-up, jewellery and accessories) to your home decor and furnishings. I confess that I don’t go round dressed from head to foot in yellow, but I do wear it frequently and there’s no room I have ever been in that has had as great an impact on me than walking into the yellow dining room at Claude Monet’s last home in Giverny in northern France (pictured below). As the light poured in through the huge windows onto the yellow decor it seemed to glow with an energising inner light that couldn’t fail to lift your spirits.

Part Two: The Colour Wheel

My other favourite colour is the amethyst shade of purple so as well as clothing in that colour, I have countless pieces of jewellery made from that semi-precious stone plus decorative pieces of the stone as ornaments.

In the same way as you can introduce your chosen colours in accessories like jewellery, scarf, belt, or your make-up colours, your favourite colours can be added to your home decor with accent pieces like scatter cushions, rugs, vases, artwork hung on the walls, or an accent wall rather than having the whole room painted in your favourite colour. Those pops of colour will still create the emotional and lifestyle enhancements that you are seeking.

The artists among you might have spotted something about my two favourite colours: they are their own complimentary colours. To understand this, you need to get familiar with the wonderful tool of the colour wheel.

If I asked you how many colours there are, you might answer: “thousands” or “countless numbers” but they only the shades and mixtures of just three primary colours plus black and white. Once you understand about how those five blend together to form the mass of colours we are used to seeing all around us, it opens up a whole new way to think about and plan how to use the colours in all aspects of your life.

Let’s start with plotting a basic colour wheel using those three primary colours of red, blue and yellow. This was the way I was taught to mix colours when I was a student at art school nearly half a century ago, and it was one of the finest foundations that I was given.

On Page 9 your workbook there is a blank grid for you to use to create your own version of the colour wheel. As I know from the countless students that I have shown how to create colour wheels, it is an invaluable exercise to actually make your own wheel by mixing the different colours. It will certainly give you a great depth of understanding about colours, but if you have not got the time or the paints, then you can simply read the following description and study the illustrations.

Once you really know about how to create different colours and shades of colour you will be able to carry that colour in your head and match it to a colour that you see. For instance, you go into a shop and you will know if that green top will match the floral skirt you bought last month, or if those scatter cushions will go with the new lounge curtains.

It really is incredible how difficult it can be for some people to carry a colour accurately, yet once you are used to seeing where the colour sits on a colour wheel you will understand its composition and you will know if the green is too blue, needs more black or yellow, etc.

Primary and secondary colours

On Page 10 of your workbook, you will see the first illustration of the colour wheel with those three primary colours spaced equally around the circle. Please note that I am talking about mixing paint pigments and not the colour wheel you may see on your computer which is the red, green, blue colour wheel used for mixing light.

The next step is to blend each of the pairs of primary colours into the secondary colours which sit halfway between the two primaries.

So, red and yellow mix to form orange . . . when you try mixing these with actual paints, you will need very little red and lots of yellow because yellow is a much weaker colour than red when it comes to blending pigments.

Yellow then mixes with blue to form the first of many, many shades of green that you can create which is imperative if you want to paint landscapes. Once again, to get a green that is midway between the two primary colours, you will need more yellow than blue pigment.

The remaining pairing is blue with red. Whereas red was by far the stronger colour when we were creating orange, red and blue can meet on equal terms to form purple.

Thus, red, yellow and blue are your primary colours, and orange, green and purple are your secondary colours (Page 11).

Completing the pure colour ring

The next step in creating a colour wheel is to join up those primary and secondary colours with those that are partway between the colours we already have (page 12 of your workbook).

So, starting at the top and working clockwise, we create an orange that is nearly red but heading towards orange; then when you get past orange, you are add more yellow to get towards that primary colour.

Note, I have only put one step in between the primary and secondary colours but you can put as many different shades/steps in as you want between each pair of colours.

From yellow you start adding a bit of your secondary colour of green, always remembering that yellow is the weaker colour so you need very little green or you will have to add more yellow to get a green that is just starting to move away from pure yellow.

Continue round the wheel adding more blue to the green, then adding blue to the purple to create shades like dark grapes, and finally adding red and purple creating burgundy-type shades until you complete that ring of the colour wheel. I call this one the “pure colour” ring because it is made from just those three primary colours.

Complementary colours

When you look at the first six colours on the colour wheel, you will notice that each secondary colour – made from a pair of primary colours – sits on the colour wheel at the point opposite the remaining primary colour (Page 13).

So, purple (made from red and blue) is opposite the remaining primary colour of yellow – my two favourite colours. Green (made with blue and yellow) sits opposite red, and orange (made with red and yellow) sits opposite blue.

These are known as “complementary colours” and they form the strongest contrast in the eye so, if you want something to stand out and make an impact, think about using the complementary colours. For instance look how the golden desert sands light up with bright blue sky above or the cheery Christmas colours of red and green.

Next time you see a thunderstorm brewing and the clouds are turning an ominous purple, just look at any green plant life around you and notice how the yellow quality of that greenery shines brightly against the purple sky.

Black and white

We usually talk of three primary colours plus black and white because the latter are often not seen as actual colours. When it comes to mixing light, white light is created by blending equal parts of the three primary colours while black is an absence of colour. In mixing pigment colours we need white and black pigments because if we mix the three primary colours we get brown and there is no way of mixing black.

When I am creating a colour wheel, the pure colour ring is the second one in so that leaves an outer ring, an inner ring and the central circle. These three sections are where we add black and white.

Pale shades

When you mix each of the pure colour ring with white it creates all the pale shades: pink, peach, lemon, pale greens, light blue, lilac, etc see Page 14 of your workbook.

White is fairly weak, like yellow, so you have to either add a lot of white or only a touch of the other colour to create the pale versions. Once again, I have split this ring into two to create light and much paler versions of the pure colour ring.

Note, that if you are using watercolour paints to mix these colours, then just adding a greater proportion of water to pigment will give you pale versions of the colours. It is when you are using acrylics or oils that you will have to add white.

Darker shades

The outer ring is the one where I add black to each of the colours and shades from the ‘pure ring’. Once again, you can create lots of shades from these new colours, but suffice for now I have just split it into two rings to show you what black does when you add a touch and then a reasonable amount of it.

Add black to yellow and it creates green. Add black to red and it creates purple. This is just what blue did to both red and yellow only the shades will be distinctly different. Once my art students are mixing colours they understand my descriptions of greens as being a blue-green or a black-green. Both greens have to have yellow in them but they can be created with black or blue, or both.

When you add the black to the orange sections of the colour wheel you start to get tans and browns which again shows the similarity in effect between blue and black. Generally speaking, brown is said to be made up of all three of the primary colours (red, yellow and blue) but it can also be made with orange (red and yellow) plus black see Page 15 of your workbook.

Black + white = shades of grey

While most people think of grey as being made of black and white – and it can be – there are also greys that include every colour from that pure ring of colour.

You can try creating various shades of grey by adding both black and white in varying proportions to all the different colours you have already created and put them into the central section on your colour wheel grid.

The incredible teacher who gave me my foundation at art school used to say: “If you want a colour and it’s not red, yellow, blue, black or white, mix it!” Once you have created your own colour wheel you will begin to understand why I consider that to be one of the finest foundations and most useful techniques to have been taught or to pass on to my art students. For full colour wheel, see Page 15 of your workbook.

Part Three: Using colour to enhance your mood and environment

Thus, when you are looking round at what colours you are drawn to, really think about what shades those colours are as well because you are bound to feel different about the various shades. For example, while I love yellow in general, I know that I feel differently when wearing lemon yellow compared to mustard shades but I particularly love the sunshine yellow of daffodils and sunflowers . . . in fact I have a pair of bright yellow trousers that I got half a century ago and still wear to this day!

The next step is to think about how colours can alter your mood and mindset and how you respond to this ability.

It is a bit of a chicken and egg situation, but when it comes to choosing what colours you are going to wear, here’s another interesting question to ask yourself: do you pick colours to wear that match the mood you are currently in or do you choose them for the mood you would like to create?

That can alter from day to day or one part of the day to another; it can be determined by what has just happened or what you hope or fear is going to happen.

You may be feeling anxious about a forthcoming situation but really you would benefit from feeling calm and centred; or perhaps you are feeling a little below par whereas you could do with being bright and energised to face the day ahead. How do you respond? Do you select colours to wear that reflect the state of mind you are in, or do you look for colours that will help you get into that optimum frame of mind? If you answer yes to the former, then why not think about how you could switch to the latter?

Look at the colours of whatever you are wearing now and unless it is an official uniform that you have to wear, then anyone who sees you would conclude that what you are wearing is your personal preference. So what is that saying about you and how you are feeling?

Most people accept that the type of garment and the style they are wearing will say a great deal about their personality, individuality, levels of confidence and general response to the situations they anticipated being involved in when they got ready. However, do you also stop to think that everything you are wearing has colours of some shade involved and those colours will definitely speak volumes about you as well as impacting on you?

The next time you are going somewhere that is important to you think carefully about what you are going to choose to wear and why? Not just the colours of the main outfit but also the accessories and even the colours of your make-up.

Ask yourself how you will want to feel at this event? What impression do you want to give and can colours give you a bit of a boost to be able to achieve it?

Now that you know from having done those earlier exercises what colours enhance your mood, enliven your energy levels, and don’t drain you of colour and life-force, you have some powerful assistants to help you plan your wardrobe for all those important occasions. You will also have a greater understanding of how colours react with one another to be able to plan which outfit to wear and what accessories go with it.

On pages 18-20 of your workbook, there are pages for you to work out what will be the perfect outfit for the event to create exactly the right impression using all the information that you have discovered about mixing and matching colours, the colours that you resonate most with and how those colours go together.

Colour-coding your home

While changing your outfits can be done easily from day to day and event to event, changing your home surroundings is not something that you will be doing with such regularity so it needs even more planning and co-ordination. However, it doesn’t have to cost a fortune to ring the changes and start to set the scene if you begin with accent colours in accessories or just painting a statement wall.

Go back to your workbook and look at the favourite colours and how you responded to them. Then think about the appropriate places where you can increase these colours in your personal life and home surroundings to start to create your ideal life. Don’t forget to do the negative colours checklist and try to remove them, or minimise them, from your surroundings.

In your workbook on Pages 22-27 there are charts for you to fill in for different rooms – if there are more rooms that you need to colour-code, just print out some extra pages.

The easiest place to start is with your own rooms rather than ones that you share with other family members as you get to decide the colour scheme you want. It may also sound obvious – but not everyone thinks about it – that you need to consider what the room is used for before you rush headlong into changing it.

You have already discovered that some colours are energising and uplifting . . . these are not really the colours that you want for the bedroom where you want to get a peaceful night’s rest. Instead, you want to look for restful and calming shades.

Your office or studio, on the other hand, would no doubt benefit from an injection of vibrant energy to boost you when you are flagging at the end of the day. At the same time, you probably don’t want lots of busy patterns and loads of items that will take your attention away from the tasks in hand. Use pages 22-24 for your own rooms.

Family and entertaining rooms

While you may have favourite colours that you wish to surround yourself with, if you share your home with other family members, you will need to formulate a colour scheme that suits everyone or at least come to a joint resolution depending on the actual room.

Your home entertaining areas – lounge, dining room, maybe even kitchen – are areas in which you can show the world your personality, interests, and the people and places that you love. It should also be somewhere warm and welcoming – I don’t know about you but I can’t relax in a room that is a cold, grey, minimalist “place” that is meant to be a “lounge”. The word “lounge” indicates relaxing and feeling at ease; the room is where you want friends to gather and enjoy good company and I visualise it ringing with chatter and laughter so it should have warm, vibrant colours to match. Use pages 25-27 in your workbook for these rooms.

Bringing you a colourful future

This time we have looked at ways you can discover and chart your own emotional responses to colour. In future “Picture Perfect” blogs I will look at practical ways you can use your favourite colours in artwork, decor and furnishings. This will enable you to stamp your personality on your home and create a subconscious narrative about you and your lifestyle for your guests.

There will also be blogs helping you to read and understand artworks including their use of colour, the shapes and elements used in the picture, and how they have been placed within the overall composition. This can help you in choosing or commissioning artworks for your home or office and can even help you to take better photographs.

Now that you have signed up to receive my “Picture Perfect” newsletter you will be the first to hear of the next blog posts, new products and exhibition news as well as seeing my latest works straight off the easel. You can even send in your own art questions to be answered in a future blog post.