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If you've been reading my blogs for the last year, you may recall an article titled "Tangled Up in Blue" about Pantone's Color of the Year 2022. The color was "Very Peri," a delicious shade of periwinkle blue.The Pantone Color Institute is responsible for this annual selection and in 2023 year developed and awarded "Viva Magenta" with the honor. But let's start at the beginning.

For those of you who may not know, Pantone, the company, has been around since 1963. It's always been in my scope of knowledge because my brother worked in the printing industry most of his life and Pantone colors were often part of the selection process for printed material. In 1963, Pantone created the Color Matching System, a color communication system with 500 available colors. (Today there are more than 3,000.) This innovative system allowed for the selection and accurate reproduction of products across the globe. Whether you were printing textiles, signs, logos, plastics, lipstick tubes, the tail of an airplane or simple pigments, they would reproduce consistently when selecting a proprietary Pantone color no matter where you were in the world. The chip card color array is a staple in many offices. I may still have one lurking around in my cabinets somewhere.

Twenty years past their beginning, Pantone established the Pantone Color Institute. The Color Institute serves as a consulting service to advise companies on color choices and trends to make sure the selection is a strategic asset to whatever you are going to produce and/or market.A large part of their service is analyzing the emotional impact of colors that you may use in your new product or design. The color of the year has been bursting into contemporary culture each year for all 20 years through the careful work of this institute.

This year's color, Viva Magenta 18-1750 is described by Pantone in this way: Viva Magenta vibrates with vim and vigor. It is brave and fearless. It is a shade rooted in nature descending from the red family and expressive of a new signal of strength. Viva magenta pulsates a color whose exuberance promotes a joyous and optimistic celebration, writing a new narrative.

Photo Credit:  Pantone.org

And there's more: This year's color is powerful and empowering, it is a new animated red that revels in pure joy, encouraging experimentation and self-expression without restraint, an electrifying and boundaryless shade that is manifesting as a stand out statement. It has a verve for life and a rebellious spirit. It is a color that is audacious, full of wit and inclusive of all. In this age of technology, we look to draw inspiration from nature and what is real.

Wait - there is still more descriptive verbiage from the Pantone Color Institute: It is in the red family and is inspired by the red of cochineal, one of the most precious dyes belonging to the natural dye family and is one of the strongest and brightest the world has known. Rooted in the primordial, Pantone 18-750 Viva Magenta reconnects us to original matter, invoking the forces of nature, galvanizing our spirit and helping us build our inner strength.

Pantone.org

Whew! Clearly Pantone approaches this annual "fun" selection very seriously. The Institute looks at everything from the entertainment and travel industries to technologies, cultural events and socioeconomic conditions. For example, in 2021 when the world was reeling from the ravages of the pandemic, Pantone uncharacteristically picked two colors to reflect the dual moods of the world: bright yellow and solid gray.

According to research I found on npr.org, skeptics would say the color magenta doesn't technically exist as there is no wavelength of light that corresponds to that color, but that doesn't stop Pantone. Scientists say that magenta only exists in the space between two parts of a double rainbow. The Color Institute says of the color "it is a nuanced crimson red tone that presents a balance between warm and cool. It is assertive, but not aggressive, a carmine red that does not boldly dominate but instead takes a "fist in a velvet glove" approach."

  Cochineal is an insect about the size of a peppercorn. A colorfast pigment was produced by harvesting and grinding the dried carcasses of the female bug into a fine powder and used to dye textiles. (smithsonianmag.com) Photo Credit NPR.org

I could go on. Yes, there is more descriptive verbiage about Viva Magenta, but even more exciting is knowing that Pantone partners each year with various corporations to celebrate its color of the year. This year you can buy a Motorola cell phone in Viva Magenta. Or, if you're more of a clothes horse, you can purchase a canvas sneaker by Cariuma in Viva Magenta. (I also discovered sneakers in other Pantone colors: Pale Lilac, Greenbriar, Lion, Gargoyle Grey, Snow White and Very Peri. In fact, Helen Mirren made Greenbriar Cariuma sneakers a national phenomenon when she sported a pair of the bright sneaks!)

Photo Credit:  cariama.org

And for a complete immersion into Viva Magenta you can see an installation by Arttechouse that saturates guests in the hue in "fantastical proportions." Magentaverse opened in Miami Beach in December and you can still get tickets at least through April.

I think I'll skip Magentaverse, but there may be a pair of the sneakers in my future. After all, who wouldn't want to feel joyous, boundaryless, brave and fearless all wrapped in a rebellious spirit?

Sources: Information for this article are from Pantone.com and the Pantone Color Institute as well as NPR.org.