It’s that time of the year: when Pantone releases their Color of the Year and Palette Explorations (colorways we can be inspired by!) I’ll be doing a series on the color, I’m not sure how long it’ll run but I have a lot to say. Ha!
The color for this year is Classic Blue…Instilling calm, confidence, and connection, this enduring blue hue highlights our desire for a dependable and stable foundation on which to build as we cross the threshold into a new era
Supplies for this project are linked at the end of this post. Compensated affiliate links may be used at no cost to you.
VIDEO
TIPS FOR USING COLORWAYS
Colorways are groups of colors used on an art piece, or in decorating. Think about a living room with walls of one color, a sofa of another, and accent throw pillows in another. Play around with the percentage of a space or art piece that a color takes up, you can change up how that color combination looks in infinite ways!
- You don’t need to use ALL colors in any suggested grouping. Often just focusing on 3 or 4 is more than enough; they usually provide many more than you need.
- Choose a main color that will dominate your art. Then a secondary and an accent. You might have two accents, but that’s about all I’d recommend! It’s easy to go overboard.
- Accent colors POP. They can often be complements to the main color – opposites on the color wheel.
CARDS
Watercolor Pencil, left, and watercolor, right. (Just love the FIRE on that one!)
Polychromos pencils on the left, Copic markers on the right. (Video for that is linked at the end of this post.)
PRINT CHARTS
Coloring full charts is not really recommended; these are for IDEAS of colors to try together, not for detailed color comparisons. But for those who insist (lol I know you’re out there), here’s a blank chart to fill in yourself. You can use my colors for reference below – or go invent your own colorways to try!
Each of my pages is below, or you can download a pdf to print them all.
Note that I’m not putting these in the shop since they’re a once-a-year thing; it’ll just be on the blog.
ANOTHER VIDEO!
Go see the other half of this video opening series on the Ellen Hutson Youtube Channel HERE. There’ll be a chart over on her blog for the chart lovers out there!
QUESTION
Which of the colorways do you want me to play with? What will YOU play with? Let me know in the comments!
SUPPLIES
Some product may be provided by manufacturers for review and use. Compensated affiliate links are here at no cost to you. If you choose to shop using my EH (Ellen Hutson) links, please accept cookies on that site in order to retain the link to my blog, or that compensation does not happen for me. I appreciate your support of my work with your purchases! Full affiliate and product disclosure | My trusted partners in art
- Space Out By Brandi Kincaid, Essentials By Ellen Clear Stamps
- Neenah Cardstock, Solar White: • 25pk – • 250pk
- Blues in a bunch of mediums:
- Copic B28 – Royal Blue, Sketch Marker
- Prussian Blue, DANIEL SMITH Extra Fine Watercolors 5ml Tubes
- Prussian Blue, DANIEL SMITH Extra Fine Watercolors 15ml Tubes
- Blueprint Sketch, Ranger Distress Ink Pad
- Deep Blue (565), Tombow Dual Brush Pens
- 037 – Cornflower Blue, ZIG Clean Color Real Brush Marker
- Albrecht Dürer Watercolor Pencil Tin Set of 60, Faber-Castell (Contains 151 Helio Reddish)
- Polychromos Pencil Tin Set of 60, Faber-Castell (Contains 151 Helio Reddish)
- Set of 150, Prismacolor Premier Colored Pencils (Contains 902)
My favorite colorway is “untraditional.” I’d love to see what ideas you have for it.
I’d like to see “Ponder” I think!
These color combos really have the wheels turning in my little brain. Snorkel is obvious fun for underwater, but I think it would be interesting to try the untraditional mix. Thanks for both the great videos and sharing your charts!
Thank you for sharing that enormous amount of work. I’ll play along in February with Copics
And I’m glad I reordered my B28 last month, it’s about to be out of stock everywhere
What fun! Blue is such a fun, sunny day kind of color! I think I’m more traditional – would love to see the “Ponder” colorway demonstrated. But they’re all adventurous, which is what it’s all about!
Thanks Sandy for the great charts and all the work you do to educate us about color and art! Love it! I need to take another course from you soon, love what you do. Thanks for the reasons we shouldn’t do one of the charts ourselves, makes sense! Blue is my favorite color, along with the teals.
Thank you so much for this great video, I loved the colour of the year last year but this one is also very pretty.
When you colour your next image I love to see the Desert Twilight colours.
Have a great day.
Thank you for demonstrating how you use colorways and color trends! I look forward to seeing more. The desert twilight colorway had me thinking of night scenes before reading the name. I normally sketch with just graphite or black fountain pen ink, but paint swatches and colorways are inspiring.
Thanks for the great info, I’d love to see Exotic Tastes come to life!
I’d like to see the untraditional combo in watercolor. Thanks for sharing all of your hard work with us.
I’d like to see desert twilight combo!