Fanfare, applaud and ring out the bells, Dulux has announced its colour for 2019 and drum roll please … the tantalising ‘Spiced Honey.’
It is predicted that the colour will be our choice for home decor and styling in the coming year, and no doubt filtering through to fashion and branding. Already I have noticed Moo using a paler version in their livery and website.
Dulux chose this rich and warming colour as a nod to the unsettling nature of 2018 – and to re-energise our homes for the year ahead. There is a varied reaction to its arrival. What are your thoughts about this years selection?
Positive vibes.
Reassuring, relaxed, cosy and comforting of our time is behind the meaning of spiced honey. The theme for 2019 as explained by Dulux is, ‘Let in the Light’. After the unpredictability and uncertainty of 2018, ‘ as a nation we were overwhelmed by the deluge of news, choices and demands upon our time, causing us to close up and retreat into spaces where we feel safe and cocooned’. Dulux says ‘2019 is the time for awakening’. For the new year ahead, we’re feeling re-energised and ready to start taking decisive action.
Love or loathe?
As a fanatic of colour, I don’t think that I could dislike any. However, some niggle in the back of my mind whether I would add them to my favourite colour list. And, in the risk of not promoting this years colour, and not a fan of trends, then perhaps Spiced Honey would be the one to loose. However, this applies to the colour in its purest representation. As a singular block colour it’s feels old fashioned and dingy, but themed with other complimentary colours does give out a statement of its own.
Spiced honey has friends.
Spiced honey does not have to be alone. If joined with an assuring line up of caramels, nudes, powder pinks, warm and spicy neutrals and off whites, the effect becomes more powerful, more subtle and particularly when teamed with accents of teal, racing green and even red.
Really?
I don’t want rain on their parade - but do trend predictors and designers who decide which colours become ‘colour of the year,’ really analyse and look that far into their meanings? For me but does spiced honey seem a little too similar to last years Heart Wood?
And the psychology surrounding the names - are they just another reinvention of yet another ‘trend colour’ in an overcrowded market of reinventing colours? Well, whether you own it or loathe it, the colours are always great conversation starters and the foundation for the next steps to a grand new scheme!
Self-limiting fame.
Every colour has its day of being reinvented and given the title of ‘Colour of the Year’, to become a star for a year. So for me, I give a thumbs up for spiced honey. It has connotations of calm, cosy, reassuring, dreamy, love, relaxation, hope and new beginnings.
The consumer has the last say.
Whatever your thoughts to the fame of spiced honey, let’s draw our attention to the success of a similar collection of colours used by Kelly Hoppen, international interior designer, who has used the same palette so successfully for many years. These colours essentially became the basis her signature style, with this, I fully expect Spiced Honey to become a success.
Final note - It happened to me!
I just relaunched my website, Tracey Andrews Interiors, and the colours run a similar theme, I call it Nude. It was not planned only unknowingly absorbed into my psyche - it happens usually around this time of year!
All images attributed to Dulux.