Beige Buildings Make Me Cry

  Source: Cecil Castelucci

This post has been rattling around in my head for so long, I thought it was about time to commit it to my blog.  Obviously beige gets a hard knock as being boring and bland. This is not original news. In all fairness, it certainly has it's place in architectural color and I use it often to bridge or hold hands with other colors.  Beige can be a fickle friend to work with and can broadcast green, yellow or even pink undertones that can wreck havoc on an entire color palette.

My main peeve is when it's used on large exteriors en masse either as a lazy, quick decision or in a misguided notion of trying to choose the least offensive color to the public. From a maintenance point of view, it's somewhat cheaper to maintain buildings with less of an assortment of colors.

But what is saved in maintenace cost is lost in public perception.  It can end up sending the message of "rental" to the observer. It often looks cheap or even an eyesore to the public.  Beige buildings can also be overlooked or under appreciated as they fade into their surroundings but are not enhancing their surroundings.

 

Source: House Beautiful

I see two sorts of overlooked opportunities.  The first one is using beige on an entire building that otherwise doesn't have a lot of architectural interest.  The other is "beiging" a building that has quite a few architectural and historic qualities.  Color should be used both to give some character to a bland building or hide some of it's more glaring flaws.  Color should also be used to highlight wonderful elements on great architecture.

Now, keep in mind that setting is everything and each of these buildings is located in neighborhoods that boast vibrant architectural color as well as buildings from many different eras.

I see this above building virtually everyday when I drive my older son to high school.  It's in a wonderful neighborhood which is home to two art schools and residential homes of many inspiring, unique exterior color palettes.  While not actually a terrible beige, it's just missing out on something better. It's an interesting building that would lend itself to separating out some of it's layers.

It could stay relatively monochromatic or have a little more contrast and color.  Since this is one of the taller buildings on this street, I'd probably not go nuts with the levels of color which could overwhelm the rest of the area.

This next building is not far from my office.  It's contains rental properties and boasts great Victorian architecture.  Why not celebrate that and highlight it's elements?

 This apartment building is one of the few mid-century buildings down a long street of residential and rental properties.  It has some great stone and woodwork that deserve a more playful hand.

 This last building is also on the same street as the previous one and I've probably driven by it hundreds of times without really noticing it.  It has some great International Style architecture that I'd love to see highlighted.

 Although I'm not a huge fan of cooler white with the lighting situation here in the Bay Area, it's interesting and appropriate to add into the mix sometimes.

Taking the easy or more inexpensive way out of coloring a building can not only end up sending the wrong message to the public, it can broadcast negative feelings to many who encounter it. Thoughtful color is the best gift you can give to not only the inhabitants of your building but to those of us who encounter it on a frequent basis. 

Office After Pictures

Back in March I made the bold step of signing the lease on a small office out at the Alameda waterfront.  It had a lot going for it which won me over, including low price, flexibility and location.  While most colorists only work on site with clients, I wanted a space where I could potentially meet with clients as well.  This little office also works double duty housing my little fledgling clothing business. 

Sandwiched between a marina and the ocean is pretty sweet (though I not so secretly yearn for the larger nearby corner office with a view of San Francisco).

My lovely landlady even allowed me to paint the office. Almost unheard of these days!   I immediately thought about a dark gray and settled on Rocky Coast by Benjamin Moore (1595) in Aura. It was deep gray without unwanted undertones.

 As I mentioned in my March post, most of my office items came from Craigslist, Etsy, thrift stores and good 'ol Homegoods.  It's a fun challenge to outfit an office on a budget AND to be able to do it completely in the style you want. My poor husband had to help me haul the heavy items up to my second floor office under the vow that I was going to stay put here for awhile!  While I'm always looking for little items to add here and there, but this is how it looks so far:

Before:

After:

 

The white dresser was found nearby on Craigslist and is from Lane furniture perhaps 1960's era. Very heavy! Drexyl lamp and chair is from Homegoods.

 My favorite item-the antique coral velvet chaise lounge was also a find on Craiglist from a storage liquidator.

It's been wonderful to move most of my color "stuff" out of my home and into it's own space.  I never fail to smile when I open the door and know that this is my own little corner of the waterfront.

Color as a Super Power?

 

Art by Jimmy Turrell 

The science of how we see color is a truly fascinating and essential part of understanding color. We are still discovering so much about the vision of not only humans, but animals and insects as well. Humans are technically trichromatic, meaning we have three cones in the retina of our eyes; red, green and blue. They allow us to see 3 color ranges which equal about 10 million different hues.

 While we've known about color blindness in the human eye for decades, there appears to be research that some humans have the ability to see more colors than the average person. I guess you can say they have super human color powers! Sorry guys, this looks like it's mainly a superpower for the ladies.

 
Those with super color vision are called tetrachromats and may be able to see as many as 100 million colors with an extra cone believed to be in the orange range.

This color vision superpower is related to our X chromosomes. Because men only have one of these, colorblindness is most common in men. The genes for the pigments in green and red cones lie on the X chromosome, and because women have 2 X chromosomes, this creates the chance for one type of red cone to be activated on one X chromosome and the other type of red cone on the other one. Women may also have two distinct green cones on either X chromosome. 

Many researchers think this might be connected to women who are genetically linked to men with color blindness. While true color blindness (achromatopsia) is very rare, there is more commonly a deficiency in one of the cones spectral sensitivity:

Protanomaly is a mild color vision defect in which an altered spectral sensitivity of red retinal receptors (closer to green receptor response) results in poor red–green hue discrimination. It is hereditary, sex-linked, and present in 1% of males. 

Deuteranomaly, caused by a shift in the green retinal receptors, is by far the most common type of color vision deficiency, mildly affecting red–green hue discrimination in 5% of males. It is hereditary and sex-linked.   

Tritanomaly is a rare, hereditary color vision deficiency affecting blue–yellow hue discrimination. It is not sex-linked.  

The below picture illustrates some of the visual difference in the most common types of color blindness.  

 

 

This image (when viewed in full size, 1000 pixels wide) contains 1 million pixels, each of a different color. 

 The idea that they're might be tetrachromats among us goes back all the way to 1948 when it was mentioned by Dutch scientist HL de Vries . Over the course of two decades, Newcastle University neuroscientist Gabriele Jordan and her colleagues have been researching this possibility by testing the mothers of sons with color impairment. Initial tests came up empty until they switched methods in 2007.

In the new test each woman would look into an optical device showing her three tiny discs in rapid succession. One of the discs was a nearly identical mixture of red and green, while two of the discs were a pure orange wavelength. The women aren't told which is which. 

Women with two distinct red cones would see the red-green disc differently than the orange discs. One woman, A doctor in northern England, referred to only as cDa29, was able to see the difference and is the first tetrachromat known to science. She is now conducting genetic tests on the woman's saliva to verify whether she has the genes for distinct red cones.  This puts a human more within the range of vision of most birds, reptiles and amphibians who can often see into the Ultraviolet wavelength.

While some women may technically have the fourth cone,  their red cones may be too close together in wavelength to notice a spectral difference.  Researchers differ on what percentage of the population of women this relates to but the most common estimate I've read is 2-3% of all woman are tetrachromats. How different they see from the rest of us is up for debate. Some say they may see a larger range of subtle color and undertones while other researchers muse whether the brain may need to learn to use a fourth cone. This is a superpower I could embrace!

Color and Other Random Inspirations

Happy Summer! 

Hope yours is off to a colorful start!  It's an ideal time to let thoughts (and feet) wander. What's inspiring you? Making you visually happy? So many things are inspiring me right now.  Here's just a few, pardon the randomness:


1. My new office color, Benjamin Moore's Rocky Coast:

This ended up being the perfect grey without unwanted undertones to support the colorful art and furniture in my office ( pictures to come!)




2. 130 years of Vogue color. Artist Arthur Buxton chose the top 5 most prominent colors from each Vogue cover over 130 years and used open source sampling tools to sandwich them into gorgeous visuals. 

Each vertical column represents a year of magazine covers, while each horizontal column represents a month. You can see the color trends from different countries and different years. You can read his blog here.



3.Using color to instill pride and a sense of well being.  Project Color Corps is doing this right in my own city of Oakland. 

Color legend, Laura Guido-Clark, and her team are repainting the dull, depressing colors of an Oakland school considered to have a high at risk/disadvantaged community, into a student advised palette of wonderful color.  Read more about the project here.




4. Pantone's color of the year, Tangerine Tango

This orangy-red has been making me smile despite the fact that I've always shied away from oranges.  I think I'm converting! This color has been showing up in so many fashion and home items:

 Source: Compartmentlife.com

I was pleasantly surprised to see their partnership with Sephora make-up stores with all sorts of fun visuals.  Below is a pop-up shop in New York featuring giant color strips!

5. Thrifting!  A passion of mine on and off for 30 years. Talk about finding some color for your wardrobe and home!

6. The Color Run!  I will be running this along with my family in San Francisco in a couple of weeks-our first time:

Find out more info on Color Run in your area here!

 7. .....and whoever the awesome person is that I spotted driving this pink vintage Mustang across the Bay Bridge recently, thank you:

75 Years of Golden Gate Color

 Credit: Erza Shaw

In the midst of the big Memorial Day weekend, there was a very special birthday to celebrate. The Golden Gate Bridge turned 75 on Sunday! As a native to the Bay Area, I get to see this landmark almost daily from my travels around the Oakland area....and I never take that for granted.  I was lucky enough to watch the amazing firework display from the deck of a friends home as we all cheered this icon who never seems to age a day.

Credit: National Geographic

The Golden Gate Bridge is much more than just a treasure to those of us in the Bay Area; It's a landmark known worldwide. I would be remiss as a Bay Area colorist if I didn't talk about it's unusual hue that sets it apart from other bridges.

The first misconception is that it is named FOR it's color. It's actually named for covering the expanse of the Golden Gate Strait which leads out to the Pacific Ocean. It was named in 1846 by Army Captain John Fremont because it reminded him of Golden Horn harbor in Istanbul.

View of Strait in 1891

Before the bridge, the bay was clogged with ferries carrying people between Marin and San Francisco. The bold idea of engineer and bridge builder, Joseph Strauss, was that an bridge should be built across the strait.

 View of early bridge construction in 1933

 It had plenty of naysayers that doubted it could be done due to the strait's infamous of high winds.   The Depression was also going on and the bridge was opposed by many special interest groups, but victoriously voted in by the locals granting a 35 million dollar bond.

Joseph Strauss

Construction began in 1933. Like most bridges at time of construction, colors under consideration were black, gray or silver. Since this was to be the largest suspension bridge ever built, a consulting architect by the name of Irving Morrow who was working on bridge lighting and it's Art Deco elements, made the case for a color that was considered shocking!

                                                                                      Irving Morrow

In his report, available here, which is a must read for color nerds and Golden Gate bridge fans alike, Morrow, states, 

“During a considerable portion of the year, particularly during summer, the San Francisco Bay area is covered by high fogs and is relatively sunless. At these times the                  atmosphere is gray. In sunny weather the predominant color of bay and ocean is blue. In other words, the prevalent atmospheric colors are cool. A structure which is to be emphasized must appear in contrasting or warm colors”. He went on to scold local architects that local color was “on the whole timidly colorless without the accent and warmth which conditions call for”.

He ruled out yellow as “lacking substance” and reds as appearing “heavy and without luminosity”.

He was taken with the red lead paint often used as primer for steel so his considerations were:

a) “Orange vermillion, or the color of shop red lead paint”

b) “Orange vermillion, slightly tinged with brunt sienna.”

c) “Burnt Sienna leaning toward orange vermillion.”

d)“Burnt Sienna”.

Local artist, Benjamin Buffano and other locals supported this bold choice although bridge authorities did not due to their fears of wearability. They relented when Morrow found a paint capable of less frequent maintenance. The final color chosen for the bridge was called International Orange (sometimes called International Airway Orange) and was considered very unusual at the time. The US Navy was hoping for black and yellow stripes! 

 While there are exact color recipes available by the Golden Gate Bridge Highway and Transportation District available here, it is considered closest to Pantone 180. The paint company that is currently under contract to provide paint for the bridge is Sherwin Williams. While they custom mix the bridges exact formula, Sherwin Williams nearest color to the Golden Gate Bridge is Fireweed, SW 6328 and Benjamin Moore's Hot Apple Spice 2005-20.

The original paint, which was heavily lead based, was slowly removed between 1965 and 1995. Advances in paint technology and it's resistance to erosion certainly help, but the bridge is still continuously touched up by a team of 28 painters. 

Source: Golden Gate Highway and Transportation District

After 75 years, this majestic lady certainly deserves the continued upkeep and attention.  Happy 75th Birthday, you gorgeous bridge.

Credit:Thomas Hawk