I love all the pretty colors
One night I’m walking through JCP looking at curtains and cookware when I round the corner and there stands a huge display devoted to products using Pantone colors. The graphic designer geek in me woke up.
Pantone is the system we use to select colors in the design world. The Pantone Matching System (PMS) is made up of standardized color charts similar to what you’d find in a paint store. For example one of my favorite reds is PMS 186. There are different kinds of Pantone books that show how that red will look if printed in an ink that is a pigment versus how that same color will look when built using full color process printing. Process color printing is when color is created using the inks cyan, magenta, yellow and black, referred to as CMYK. PMS books also will give you web colors and RGB values for use on computer screens. Some PMS books will show what a color will look like on coated versus uncoated paper. There are metallic ink and pastel color Pantone books.
In recent years they’ve even added flesh tones as a guide choice. A Brazilian artist has taken the task to photograph people and match them with their specific Pantone color from that guide.
Back to my geek moment…
Occasionally you’d see the Pantone brand make its way onto a mug or a t-shirt. But seeing JCP’s offering of bath towels, bed sheet sets, pillows and accessories such as toothbrush holders and soap dispensers made me log on to the Pantone site to see where else the influence of my old friend the PMS (Pantone Matching System) book would land. The answer: Lowes for paints and Sephora for makeup. Although I don’t plan to apply any eye shadow anytime soon, my home office is likely the next room I’ll paint, and I’ll check the choices for sure.
And like a kid in a candy store I was excited to see eyewear with interchangeable frames, phone cases, earbuds, pens, and flash drives. If you’re curious what else you can get in a great color, check out http://www.pantone.com/pages/pantone/category.aspx?ca=33
There’s no major lesson or tip to learn from this blog. I just wanted to share my nerd excitement for the ever-expanding Pantone Universe. Plus, Christmas is only a few months away. My coworkers will groan, but feel free to buy me any of the awesome Pantone products.