Each year, Pantone selects a Color of the Year. This year the chosen one: Greenery, Pantone 15-0343.
Pantone descirbes Greenery in this way:
“A refreshing and revitalizing shade, Greenery is symbolic of new beginnings.
Greenery is a fresh and zesty yellow-green shade that evokes the first days of spring when nature’s greens revive, restore and renew. Illustrative of flourishing foliage and the lushness of the great outdoors, the fortifying attributes of Greenery signals consumers to take a deep breath, oxygenate and reinvigorate.
Greenery is nature’s neutral. The more submerged people are in modern life, the greater their innate craving to immerse themselves in the physical beauty and inherent unity of the natural world. This shift is reflected by the proliferation of all things expressive of Greenery in daily lives through urban planning, architecture, lifestyle and design choices globally. A constant on the periphery, Greenery is now being pulled to the forefront – it is an omnipresent hue around the world.
A life-affirming shade, Greenery is also emblematic of the pursuit of personal passions and vitality.
What is the PANTONE Color of the Year? A symbolic color selection; a color snapshot of what we see taking place in our global culture that serves as an expression of a mood and an attitude.”
Greenery has more yellow than I like, but I appreciate the “new life” quality of a spring-green. How can you not like such a beautiful color?
I think about green at the moment because of the vibrant shade I saw in the high plains of Northeastern Wyoming when I swooped into the state last week on I 90. I was traveling east on I 90, but after Billings, MT the Interstate takes a southerly dip along the Big Horns in Wyoming before curving back toward the Black Hills in South Dakota. This green is the most vibrant I have seen In the 10-plus years I have explored and camped in the area.The rugged plains usually display a subtle green tinge in the spring, but the burst is short-lived and the land returns quickly to a tawny buff color. without a trace of green in the grasses.
Typical colors of the High Plains
This year, Super Green, a soul-grabbing intensity of color that reveals a new potential of the arid landscape. Green of this magnitude arrives only when rains drench the plains during the winter. Water becomes so plentiful that plants can drink deeply and frequently before the soil dries out again, and an orgy of rapid, intense growth occurs in this lavish setting.
On that drive toward the Black Hills, I was not looking at Pantone’s star of the year: Greenery 15-0343. An emerald-green? My green had the same saturated, vibrant quality but with blue undertones. Sage green? Too dull and silvery for what I saw before me. I wondered, which tints in an artist’s toolbox could be mixed to make this hue? Then I realized what made the color so unique: external factors. In addition to the effects of rain on plant growth, I was looking at a textured, 3-dimensional color that was so alive because of the angle of the evening spring sun and the shadows cast by great mountains. The mix was more than the sum of its pigments thanks to the elements of low-angle sunlight reflecting on the plump, water-filled grasses, flowers, and shrubs. I doubt that Pantone can create such a formula, even an alchemist cannot capture the sunlight and recreate my High Plains Green After a Rainy Winter. Natures goodness cannot live in a bottle or on a painter’s palette; it lives outside.
From there, I find it easy to apply this lesson to humans. We also become multi-dimensional outdoors. Sunlight, moon rays, wind, rain, crashing waves, bird songs, a lightening display – each contributes to our moods as our senses experience the world around us. Sunlight, which promotes the manufacture of Vitamin D in our cells, even contributes to our physical health. No wonder isolation bears down on the soul. Removed from nature, we are only one-dimensional.
