Design Corner: Psychology of Color Part #2

This darn snowstorm and closing of school plus hubby being sick Monday derailed my “Monday Design Corner”. Darn it to heck and back! So I will rename it just “Design Corner” So here is part #2 of the Psychology of color series. You can read "Psychology of color Part #1" if you wish to by clicking on the link.

Color is an amazing thing. We use color to describe emotion sometimes like we are green with envy or red with anger or even that we feel blue. But color can also affect our moods, appetite and energy levels. Most people have favorite colors in clothes, cars and their home. I’ve noticed that CSI shows have used color to make each division of their show be unique. CSI in Vegas is mostly at night but with bright light-like colors. In CSI Miami the colors are tropical and match the locale for sure and CSI New York has darker muted colors but seem to emphasize blue (at least the last time I watched it, it might have changed.) So color is an amazing tool and for those of us with sight, sometimes a thing we take for granted or not even realize its effects.

Today I will cover the color blue.

It is the color most people pick as their favorite color. It’s in the cool family and is one of the primary colors (like red).

Blue is calming and cool. It is often thought that most people like the color because they associate it with the sky and heaven.

Soothing blue walls can make a south- or west-facing room feel cooler. Many things I have read have said that blue is an ideal bedroom color choice for both adults and children.

Interestingly enough the blue that soothes us and lulls us to sleep or cools us also suppresses appetites, so try to keep it out of the dining room. The difference in lightness and darkness of a color is called it’s ‘value.’ The value of the color depends on the amount of light it reflects (lighter) or absorbs (darker.) You’ve probably seen the value of a color in a paint store on a paint deck (a sample of a color ranging from light to dark in the same ‘hue’. These terms are given to color in the Munsell system and include ‘hue, value and chroma’.) The spectrum of blue is wide in terms of what different shades of blue can do to a space. An example of this: a turquoise can create a retro look but a teal has a darker, more sophisticated look.

Here are some locations I found about the color blue, after writing this. (My writings are based on notes from college and research through the years.) But they all seem to say basically the same thing.

http://desktoppub.about.com/cs/colorselection/p/blue.htm

http://fengshui.about.com/od/fengshuiuseofcolors/qt/fengshuiblue.htm

http://interiordec.about.com/cs/colorindecor/a/beachcolorschem.htm