August 13, 2020

How To Get Colour Confident

I am often asked how to get colour confidence so I thought I would share a few tips below and get you feeling colour confident in no time! Colour has different meanings for all of us, history, marketing and nature have shaped the way we perceive colour.

Did you know that the gender-specific colours pink and blue were initially the opposite way round? Pink for boys and blue for girls.

They were swapped in the 1940s by manufacturers for marketing reasons in America. It’s since then used as a gender signifier however modern social norms are now challenging that, to create more gender-neutral colour schemes. See what I mean about how colour means different thing to each of us.

Becoming colour confident is not about being bold and clashing colours. It’s about finding the right colours that work for you, your eye and how you want the room to feel.

1. Look in Your Wardrobe

This is the first port of call when I work with clients. There’s a saying if can wear it, you can live with it! So go ahead have a look, what’s in your wardrobe?

What are the colours you wear the most, please don’t say black! Mind you if it is black, how do you feel about dark interiors? You don’t need to paint your whole house black of course!

You can start in a smaller room and look at softer dark colours like navy blue or charcoal grey. Back to the wardrobe, pick out a few of your favourite pieces you wear often, can you pick out a few colours?

Look for similar colours on a colour chart and see what rooms you can start to use them.

Photo by Alyssa Strohmann on Unsplash

2. Find Inspiration

If your wardrobe is no good, perhaps you have a uniform you wear most of the time or your wardrobe doesn’t reflect your personality enough. Let’s look towards things that get you inspired.

It could be a memorable holiday, piece of artwork or perhaps you need some inspiration? I highly recommend venturing out to your local city, absorb the sights and sounds, visit art galleries or vintage shops.

Find whatever it is that makes you feel inspired, your happy place if you will. When you have found your piece of inspiration, what do you see? What colours jump at you? How to get colour confidence lies in how we feel more than anything.

Image copyright Rukmini Patel

3. Look at Nature

Nature is one of my favourite places to get colour confidence. Mother nature has the best colour schemes! She knows what colours go together, so it’s a good place to start. I also think being in nature gives you clarity allowing you to make those design decisions better.

If like me you like visiting National Trust houses and gardens, perhaps grab your camera next time and take pictures of any flowers or plants are you drawn to? You can then print them out and use them for your mood board (see next point).

Being in nature seeing the colours with your eye is very different from seeing colours on screen. I’m drawn to pink/peachy roses. They are so elegant and beautiful and remind me of regal rooms in a stately home.

Image copyright Rukmini Patel

4. Create a Mood Board

Now it’s time to put your ideas down on paper, the exciting bit! Creating a mood board of colours, inspiration is a good way of how to get colour confidence.

A mood board will show you how the colours work with each other and allow you to change things if you’re not happy with them.

It will give you the confidence to use those colours knowing that they work on the mood board. So get mood boarding!

5. Start Testing

Lastly how to get colour confidence also starts with just starting somewhere! Get those test pots out and start sampling the colours. See how you feel about them before taking the plunge? Perhaps you need to go a shade darker or lighter?

The actual colour can be different from what you see on the colour chart and in pictures. It also warms you up mentally so you know what’s coming! Of course, if you’re not keen on it you can change it. But the point is by taking action you are paving the way to increase your colour confidence.

I hope you enjoyed this post and it has given you some ideas to get more confident with colour. Click here to go back to the Blog Homepage.

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