There are many women in the world that will never be caught dead in anything other than a tan or black shoe. As a woman, I understand the importance of such staples in one’s collection, but somehow feel my life would be a little less fun without the brightly colored shoes that are in mine. Of course, women’s shoes in general have a long history, and they have meant many things to both men and women alike. A shoe can match a bag, complement an ensemble, or make a bold statement all on its own. Here are a few insights into the colors of shoes (and what they sometimes communicate).

Photo by kalandrakas

The red shoe
Depending on who you talk to, a woman who wears red shoes is either brave and fashionable or she is advertising her status as a lady of the night. It’s amusing to think there could be such contrasting reactions, but red tends to make a statement in all types of fashion, and shoes are no exception. Many women view red shoes as a symbol of power, much like a feminine version of a men’s “power tie”. To date, if a woman chooses to wear any brightly colored shoe outside of her basic neutral choices, it tends to be a red shoe.

Photo by PinkMoose

The primary shoe
You don’t see a lot of shoes in primary shades on women, and there’s a reason — it takes a very specific type of personality to pull it off. Not unlike the colors themselves, a shoe in a primary shade is attention-grabbing, and unless a woman focuses on collecting clothing to complement such footwear, it’s likely shoes of the same hue will sit in the back of the closet. With the recent popularity surge in eighties-inspired fashions, primary colors for the feet have made a bit of a comeback, but who knows how long they will will stick around.


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Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the last twelve years, you have probably seen at least one Pixar film. The famous animation studio seems to be releasing one delightful film after another, consistently producing family-friendly fare that speaks to both children and adults. Any lover of vivid color will find great delight in any of their films, as they tend to be a sensational assault on the senses. Some fans have voiced their feelings about Pixar as the “new voice” of Disney, as they continue to produce beautiful films with what appears as effortless grace.

Of course, things are not always quite what they seem, and a look behind the scenes proves that Pixar has worked quite tirelessly to achieve the success they now enjoy. Pixar’s beginning reach all the way back to 1979, when they were founded as The Graphics Group, which was one third of the Computer Division of Lucasfilm. The team worked on the precursor to the programming interface RenderMan, which was called Motion Doctor at that time. The most remarkable quality about this program was that it allowed cel animators to use computer animation with very little formal training.

The team went on to work on several Lucasfilm and projects such as Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan and Young Sherlock Holmes. In 1986 ownership of the group changed hands, purchased by Steve Jobs shortly after his departure from Apple Computer. After plowing a cool 5 million into the company, he renamed it Pixar, a made-up Spanish verb meaning “to make pixels” or “to make pictures”.

Pixar started off as a top-notch computer hardware company whose main product was the Pixar Image Computer, which was intended for government and medical use only. How funny to think that the creative demon that is Pixar now could have spent their days in a very different way! Disney were actually one of the leading buyers for these computers, but as a whole they did not sell well. The future was looking dismal until employee John Lasseter decided to take matters into his own hands by premiering his own short demo animations at a major trade show called SIGGRAPH and met with a positive reception.


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Inspiration from the colors of the great impressionists, plus some information about each painting and artist from wikipedia.

For more information about each artist or to see more of their work, just click on any image.

Armand Guillaumin: La Place Valhubert.
		Born in Paris, France, he worked at his uncle’s lingerie shop while attending evening drawing lessons. He also worked for a French government railway before studying at the Académie Suisse in 1861. There, he met Paul Cézanne and Camille Pissarro with whom maintained lifelong friendships. While he never achieved the stature of these two, his influence on their work was significant. Cézanne attempted his first etching based on Guillaumin paintings of barges on the River Seine.

Armand Guillaumin: Sunset at Ivry
		Noted for his intense colors, major museums around the world display Guillaumin’s art. He is best remembered for his landscapes of Paris, the Creuse département, and the area around Les Adrets-de-l’Estérel near the Mediterraneran coast in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur region of France. Armand Guillaumin died in 1927 in Orly, Val-de-Marne just south of Paris.

Claude Monet: Grainstack, Sunset
		The primary subjects of all of the paintings in the series are stacks of hay that have been stacked in the field after the harvest season. The title refers primarily to a twenty-five canvas series begun the autumn of 1890 and continued through the following spring, using that year’s harvest. Some use a broader definition of the title to refer to other paintings by Monet with this same theme. The series is known for its thematic use of repetition to show differences in perception of light across various times of day, seasons, and types of weather. The subjects were painted in fields near Monet’s home in Giverny, France.

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I’ll never forget the first time I discovered Tokidoki. It was about two years ago, and I was walking in downtown San Francisco with a friend when I saw a girl walking down the street in front of me carrying a Tokidoki bag. Being a fan of cute art and vivid colors, I followed her (discreetly!) for several blocks, trying to identify more about her fantastic purse. Of course, it wasn’t long until I had solved the mystery, and soon enough I had more Tokidoki bags than I would ever need.

Italian Tokidoki creator Simone Legno founded his company in 2005 with the help of business partners Pooneh Moohajer and Ivan Arnold. The word Tokidoki means “sometimes” in Japanese, which Legno gives more background on in the form of a little enclosure card that comes with the majority of Tokidoki products. His story started back in 2003, when Pooneh Moohajer and her husband Ivan discovered Legno’s website. Pooneh was the co-founder of popular cosmetics line Hard Candy, and she saw something distinctly marketable in Legno’s design style.

Legno released his first collaboration with the company Le Sportsac in Spring 2006. The bags met a tremendous reaction from fans, who soon were rabid to collect any and all things Tokidoki. To this day, the bags that are out of print fetch up to $400 on Ebay. There are also multiple fan sites who categorize all the releases and aid collectors in finding the bags they want to add to the burgeoning collections. The best of these is Tokidoki blog, which not only updates on the bags but all the other collectibles as well. It’s an excellent place to begin if you find you have a gnawing hunger to own one of these delightful creations.

Legno’s signature style caught the eye of the designer toy world quickly as well, and soon many collectible sculptures were available. While he has collaborated with most major designers, the most popular series seems to be the one made by STRANGECo, who released two major lines, Cactus Friends and Moofia. The Cactus Friends were small animals wearing cactus-like armor, such as the little green dog Bastardino. The Moofia series was based around milk products. Fans reacted positively to these as well, as they were not only adorable but also affordable. Having been welcomed into the designer toy universe with open arms, Tokidoki found itself reaching a whole new group of fans.


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What do adorable animals, whimsical art and colorful design have in common? Design studio Meomi can tell you — If you love all of the aforementioned things, Meomi may be heaven for you when it comes to art and wallpapers.

Meomi is comprised of two artists, Vicki Wong and Michael Murphy. Together they have created art for an illustrious list of clientele, including Google, Electronic Arts and Nick Jr. Vicki and Michael also act as authors and artists behind the Octonauts series of children’s books. Meomi’s 2008 wallpaper story takes place in Kachi Kingdom, where you follow the adventures of Johnny Cloudseed, following in his grandfather’s footsteps as a seeder and planting seeds that assist the Kachi spirits to grow their “Magical Moments” plants.

Meomi reveal more about Johnny’s story month by month as new wallpapers come out (each month’s has a calendar on it so you can track the days along with the story.) Their most recent print project is Color Cloud Seeding, in which Meomi explore the lost art of “cloud gardening” in drawings, sketches and photos, creating a crisp wonderland of hues.

About those wallpapers — Meomi have a whole page of their website dedicated to them that date all the way back to 2002 (when the year ends, they provide the wallpapers with the calendars removed so you can enjoy the art on its own.) I’ve provided some of them here for you to see, but if you want the full sized versions check out the Meomi website to grab them and make your desktop worth smiling at when you come in on Monday morning.


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For the last 100 years or so kids have been exploring and creating worlds of color with Crayons. For a lot of us, our life long love affairs with color began with these wax sticks and a blank sheet of paper. According to a Yale University study, the scent of Crayola crayons is among the 20 most recognizable to American adults. Coffee and peanut butter are 1 and 2. Here we go down crayon color memory lane with all 120 color names and hex codes, fun facts and photos.

Photo by Sir Fish

Crayola crayons currently come in 120 colors including 23 reds, 20 greens, 19 blues, 16 purples, 14 oranges, 11 browns, 8 yellows, 2 grays, 2 coppers, 2 blacks, 1 white, 1 gold and 1 silver. Although Crayola crayons come in 120 different colors, the labels are only made in 18, which cover the full color spectrum. Nearly 3 billion crayons are made each year, an average of 12 million daily. That’s enough to circle the globe 6 times with color!

120 Crayon Names and Color Codes

Aaron at ColorSchemer.com created a fun list of all 120 Crayon Colors with their hex codes and RGB values. “All of these colors are rough approximations from Crayola’s current list of 120 Crayon Colors. -CS”


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With the release of the COLOURlovers API, you can now access almost 1 million named colors and more than 325,000 color palettes for your creative projects and applications. Creating a theme editor and want to give your users some color theme options? Creating a visual project that ties keywords to colors? Who knows what amazingly creative stuff people will come up with.

Below are two showcase examples of the COLOURlovers API in action as well as the full API documentation. Happy API COLOURloving!

COLOURlovers API Usage Showcase

Desktop Color Search - AIR App

Desktop Color Search is an Adobe AIR app that runs on your desktop and allows you to search the entire COLOURlovers database for colors, palettes and patterns. You’ll need to download the Adobe AIR runtime in order to run Desktop Color Search, you can use the link below to install AIR. (It works in both Windows and on Mac OS X)
Special thanks to Levi McCallum at FutonMedia for coding the AIR app.

Download Desktop Color Finder  |  Download Adobe AIR

DEKAF LOVERS

A simple interface to COLOURlover’s deep, deep palette library, it creates randomized compositions using rectangular geometry drawn by the Degrafa drawing library.
Have some fun of your own color fun with Dekaf Lovers.
 



 

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In order to support our growth and the costs of maintaining and developing new features for our color loving community, we’ve added some great extended features and are offering them as a thank you to those who support us with a small yearly sponsorship of only $20. Thank you for helping us grow our wonderful community.

To become a sponsor or to give the gift of color love, visit: www.colourlovers.com/lovers/sponsors

Benefits of Being a Sponsored COLOURlover:

- Have Your Love Notes and Subscription Updates Emailed to You
- Download All Your Colors and Palettes in One File
- See More Recent Activity on Your Profile, Colors, Palettes & Patterns
- Customize Your Profile to Show Top, New or Fave Colors, Patterns or Patterns
- See Custom Palette Widths by Default When Browsing
- Choose Your Top Groups and Lovers to Display on Your Profile
- Get Beta Access to New Tools Before They Are Launched Publicly
- Fancy Avatar and Profile Badges to Show Your Sponsorship
- Help Us Continue to Develop a Supportive, Fun and Creative Community
- More to Come Soon!

Have Your Love Notes and Subscription Updates Emailed to You

See More Recent Activity on Your Profile, Colors, Palettes & Patterns

Show Top, New or Fave Colors, Patterns or Patterns on Your Profile

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If you haven’t heard, Polaroid film is dying.

On February 8th, 2008, the Polaroid corporation announced that the incredible invention of Edwin Land has a permanent expiration date that no refrigeration can postponed; stating, “Polaroid has made the difficult decision to cease manufacturing of instant film products in 2008. We hope that you will continue to choose Polaroid products, as we take instant imaging into the digital platform with exciting new products being launched this year.” The last of the film is projected to expire in September of 2009.

It seems that there is still yet one hope remaining for Polaroid film. Save Polaroid has setup shop to assemble artists and fanatics to save Polaroid.

About Save Polaroid

On February 8, 2008, Polaroid Corporation announced that it will discontinue production of all instant film. This site will document the aftermath of this announcement and will serve as a home-base for the effort to convince another company to begin producing the cherished technology that Polaroid has so carelessly abandoned.

This site is not about saving Polaroid, the company, rather the remarkable invention of Edwin Land, the instant film that made Polaroid a household name.

Photos by Grant Hamilton

What We’ve Done So Far

Since this announcement, we’ve been assembling articles, links, stories and planning out the best way to create a joint effort to save instant film. We’ve contacted Polaroid, Fuji and Ilford about licensing.
- Save Polaroid

Rod Hunting Helps Save Polaroid

My good friend, and fellow member of the Chicago artist family The Post Family, artist Rod Hunting was asked by Save Polaroid to produce a limited run of his Polaroid print to be auctioned off on ebay to raise money for Save Polaroid. I sat down with Rod over some fine malt liquor to discus his ‘Polareds’ project, the end of Polaroid and speeding tickets.

Photo from The Post Family


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In honor of this month’s release of the United States’ redesigned five dollar bill I have been scouring through the 191 currently circulating currencies of the 192 member states of the United Nations to find some of the most colorful, unique and dramatic bank notes.

The New Five

Photo from moneycenteral.msn.com

The redesigned $5 bill was unveiled on September 20, 2007, and was issued on March 13, 2008. Previously covered here on COLOURlovers, the redesign involves some very noticeable changes, mostly for security reasons, but also in an attempt to make the bill more friendly to the visually impaired.

The new five incorporates the use of micro printing of type to make it more difficult to copy. On the front, “FIVE DOLLARS” is written inside the left and right borders. “E PLURIBUS UNUM” is printed at the top of the shield. “USA” is between the columns of the shield and “USA FIVE” is printed on the edge of the most noticeable change, the giant purple “5″.

Photo from moneycenteral.msn.com

The giant purple “5″. Yes, well, it was added to help those who are visually impaired but it may just leave more of us wishing that we were. Not that I necessarily dislike it, mostly I’m not too concerned with what the money looks like since I’m not collecting it for its aesthetic qualities, but a more reasonable choice, or at least a more colorful choice, would have been just to make the whole thing purple and start color coding all of the bills, much like many, if not most, other countries do. Maybe the Government doesn’t want to get too far away from our ‘greenback’.

One Interesting thing about the new five is the use of the EURion constellation which many photocopiers will refuse to copy. This pattern, which is used for the series of little yellow “05″s, is used on many other currencies as well.

Other changes to the bill include the increased use of water marks and an added security strip like those already used for higher denominations.

The Most Colorful Currencies

Compared to those previous drab gray and green bills the US has made some colorful changes to the currency, but it is still nothing compared to the beautifully crafted and colored currencies of Venezuela, Switzerland, and Kyrgyzstan.

The Bolívar Fuerte

Bolívar Fuerte

The Bolívar Fuerte is the new currency of Venezuela since January 1, 2008. It replaced the old Bolívar which was the currency between 1879 and 2007. My personal favorite currency, it is a great example of the amazing bright and colorful notes that are seen throughout many South America countries.

The Bolívar Fuerte includes illustrations of Francisco de Miranda, Pedro Camejo, Cacique Guaicaipuro, Luisa Cáceres de Arismendi, Simón Rodríguez and Simón Bolívar, on the fronts. On the backsides, the notes feature Amazon river dolphins, a giant armadillo, an American Harpy eagle, the hawks bill turtle, a spectacled bear and the red siskin.

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