Colors with seemingly incomprehensible names actually tell fascinating and humorous stories, at least to those who are willing to delve beneath the surface. Join me on a strange and wonderful adventure into the uncharted fringes of language, where we'll discover new "shades of meaning."

The chilly blue color called brrrrrrr refers to the "Official State Motto of Alaska," according to humorist Dave Barry (Dave Barry’s Only Travel Guide You’ll Ever Need).

by Dalephonics

With an additional "r," the watery color called brrrrrrrr conjures up the sound of someone shaking water out of his or her ears after crawling out from under a waterfall, as in Sacred Journey of the Peaceful Warrior by Dan Millman.

The green color called bbbbbb echoes a vocal imitation of "a sailing boat in a tub of water," as discussed in Baby Talk: The Art of Communicating with Infants and Toddlers by Monica Devine.

I'll tell you a secret—I can read words of one letter! Isn’t that grand? —The White Queen to Alice in Through the Looking Glass.

When the White Queen of Looking Glass fame bragged that she could read words of one letter, she beseeched Alice not to be discouraged, promising “You’ll come to it in time.” Indeed, the Queen’s one letter word vocabulary was more comprehensive than one might first assume. A word is any letter or group of letters which has meaning and is used as a unit of language. So even though there are only twenty-six letters in the English alphabet, they stand for a thousand distinct units of meaning.

Because each letter of the alphabet is so extraordinarily expressive, it comes as no surprise that artists have named colors after individual letters. With a little help from the dictionary of One-Letter Words, we can illuminate the meanings of a spectrum of colours called "A." by cbclove. Cover image by pominoz.

Designer Yaroslav Rassadin is re-imagining a 120 year old traditional handicraft from Russia, the matryoshka.

The Matryoshka, or Russian nesting dolls, date back to 1890. Traditionally hand painted with ornate detailing and a dynamic range of colors, Rassadin's take on the classic Russian nesting dolls was inspired by a combination of the "Pantone matching system and UFO minimalistic styling." His work has been described as "emotional, minimalistic and technological."

History Of the Matryoshka

Matryoshkas are a relatively new Russian handicraft; the first one dates from 1890, and is said to have been inspired by souvenir dolls from Japan. However, the concept of nested objects was familiar in Russia, having been applied to carved wooden apples and Easter eggs; the first Fabergé egg, in 1885, had a nesting of egg, yolk, hen, and crown.

Nathan Brown and Sean Leman Company: Rehab Location: San Francisco, CA Website: www.therehab.com

www.soundofcolor.com

Music is a popular source of inspiration for creating colors and what if the tables were turned with color being the source of inspiration for music?

What is the sound of color?

This abstract question is exactly what Rehab and GAP proposed to 5 music artists — DNTEL, Swiss Beatz, The Blakes, Marié Digby, and The Raveonettes. Then, the music was delivered to video directors, Chris Do, Mary Fagot, James Frost, Tom Gatsoulis, Russ Lemourex and Ryan Ebner to interpret the music and create video. The results can be found at soundofcolor.com.

Nathan Brown, Executive Director of Rehab and Creative Director, Sean Leman took a breather to speak with us about Sound of Color and non-traditional delivery of content.

CL: Please share with us a bit about Rehab’s background:

SL: Rehab was founded in 2002 by Sean Leman and Nathan Brown; both of us had worked at traditional production companies before and felt that the model could be improved upon. We believed that we could be more nimble, more adaptable, and produce work in a lot of different spaces (online, commercial ad campaigns, features, etc.).
NB: As we move forward, we're continually looking for ways to evolve traditional models of entertainment and advertising.

DNTL "Turning Red" | Red

It has been said that eyes are the window into the soul. If that is true, then eye colors are the soul’s curtains, a decorative adornment that frames your view of the main event. Human eye color is determined by a number of factors, including the pigment of melanin within the iris, as well as the thickness of iris cell layers, which causes light to be absorbed in different ways. These factors are often determined genetically, as certain eye colors can either be dominant or recessive.

Brown Eyes

Brown eyes are a dominant trait extremely prevalent in people from continents like Africa and Asia.

If you’ll recall from 10th grade biology, the easiest way to represent how dominant and recessive traits manifest themselves is using a Punnett Square. In reality, eye colors are derived from a variety of factors, including how much yellow and black pigment certain genes are coded to produce.

Blue Eyes

A recessive trait, blue eyes are often thought of as a sought-after characteristic. One study even shows that blue eyed men seek out blue-eyed women from an evolutionary standpoint in order to verify paternity.

An astonishing number of different cultures use fireworks in their celebrations of revolution, love and the passing of time. They may be used for many different types of celebrations within each culture, but the energy of color and sound carry a universal experience.

While, as you may all know, 12th century China first created fireworks to scare off evil spirits, but what you might not know is it was actually the Italians who first created the colors in fireworks.

The colors in fireworks are created by changing the 'color producing chemical' in the pyrotechnic star, which are pellets containing metal powders, salts or other compounds that, when ignited, burn a certain color. These pellets are then added to a 'lifting charge' made of gunpowder and provide the fuel to propel the shells into the air.

The Chemistry of Colors

There are two main mechanisms of color production in fireworks, incandescence and luminescence.

Red

strontium salts, lithium salts

Incandescence is light produced from heat. Heat causes a substance to become hot and glow, initially emitting infrared, then red, orange, yellow, and white light as it becomes increasingly hotter. When the temperature of a firework is controlled, the glow of components, such as charcoal, can be manipulated to be the desired color (temperature) at the proper time. Metals, such as aluminum, magnesium, and titanium, burn very brightly and are useful for increasing the temperature of the firework.

Orange

calcium salts

Though printed in black and white, great literature is bursting with vibrant colour.  In this rebus-style puzzle, color words and parts of words have been replaced with colored boxes.  Try to guess the exact hue of each.  Roll your mouse over the colored boxes to reveal the missing words.  Click the colored boxes to learn more about each hue.  Special thanks to Paul Dean for his colorful research.

by Brimley

White sheep white sheep on a blue hill / when the wind stops you all stand still / when the wind blows you run away slow / white sheep white sheep where do you go?
 
(To bed.)
 
—Anonymous, a riddle from The Faber Book of Vernacular Verse, edited by Tom Paulin, 1988.

by AJ Knowles

Over the mist the sun sets far off in heaven. Only the hills are red: field, hollow and lake are blue with shadow.
 
Now islands in the lake are black pearls set in amethyst. Now that wooded hill, a head of waving woman’s hair, is black. And see, a crescent comb of silver moon.
 
Sad and happy, I pick up my lute and sing until the stars grow pale.
 
—Tsiang-Tien, from The Jade Flute: Chinese Poems in Prose, 1960.

Color has always been an important component of fashion whether it be a heather grey or crimson red. Each designer makes color choices that will be indicative of their aesthetic, season, and era. Lately, I've been seeing beautiful and rich color choices in the fashion and accessory world. It seems that everyone is becoming obsessed with Pantone gradations. Check out some of my favorite examples of some stunningly colorful products as well as Pantone's Spring color predictions.

Softbank Cell Phones

SoftBank Cell Phones in glossy bright colors via Geeksugar

Kate Spade

Photographs taken with infrared sensitive film can create drastic contrasting colors that create a unusual and unique image. They capture colors that are outside our own range of vision, offering a perspective changing experience.

How It Works

In infrared photography, the film or image sensor used is sensitive to infrared light. The part of the spectrum used is referred to as near-infrared to distinguish it from far-infrared, which is the domain of thermal imaging. Wavelengths used for photography range from about 700 nm to about 900 nm. Usually an "infrared filter" is used; this lets infrared (IR) light pass through to the camera but blocks all or most of the visible light spectrum (and thus looks black or deep red).

When these filters are used together with infrared-sensitive film or sensors, very interesting "in-camera effects" can be obtained; false-color or black-and-white images with a dreamlike or sometimes lurid appearance known as the "Wood Effect."

The effect is mainly caused by foliage (such as tree leaves and grass) strongly reflecting in the same way visible light is reflected from snow. Chlorophyll is transparent at these wavelengths and so does not block this reflectance (see Red edge). There is a small contribution from chlorophyll fluorescence, but this is extremely small and is not the real cause of the brightness seen in infrared photographs.

Designers Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec have come up with a colorful new way to create and divide any living space.

Using interconnecting foam and fabric blocks you can create and transform any space with a dramatically colorful wall. Choosing from more than 100 color options, your personal palate will only be limited by the physical space and your imagination.

And since the blocks are light and connect together easily, you can change up your space and color patterns recurrently.

About North Tiles

Originally conceived for our new Stockholm showroom by Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec, these textile walls are constructed with individual foam fabric tiles which connect together using an ingenious folding system.