Pantone 2013 Color of the Year: Emerald

Pantone recently name  color 17-5641: Emerald Green as its 2013 color of the Year.

The Color of the Year for 2013 is a very clear departure from 2012’s Color of the Year: “Tangerine Tango,” a hot color that Pantone’s Eiseman described as “sophisticated but at the same time dramatic and seductive…an orange with a lot of depth to it.” In 2011, “Honeysuckle Pink” was the top hue, a retro hue that some characterized as “Mad Men Pink.”

But 2013 is all about a vivid, verdant shade of green that “enhances our sense of well-being further by inspiring insight, as well as promoting balance and harmony.”

To the casual observer the Color of the Year designation can seem arbitrary — in recent years, it’s bounced from shades of blue to yellow to green to pink to orange — those who study color say it’s hardly random.

“When we’re traveling around the world, we look at little clues to how we think color is progressing,” said Eiseman. said.

But like so many good things, the emerald trend seemed to start at home. “We started to see it in housewares,” Eiseman said.

Cuisinart and Le Creuset have been introducing emerald into their lines, and in Europe, the color has been showing up in glassware and ceramics.

“It has a natural affinity to work beautifully with anything with that glow,” says Eiseman.

The fashion world seems to have embraced the color, especially with celebrities Angelina Jolie, Catherine Zeta-Jones and Elizabeth Moss looking fabulous in jewel-colored gowns. The reaction from Interior Designers seems to be mixed.

Are you on board or will your color choices tend to shift a different direction?