PCA Articles
PPG Brand’s 2020 Color of the Year: Chinese Porcelain
This is a guest blog post from PCA sponsor, PPG.
Unprecedented challenges are being faced around the world, creating a new wave of anxiety in consumers. Recent studies have found that millennials, especially women, are the most anxious generation in history. These mental health challenges have led consumers to crave real-life connection, reassurance, purpose-driven mindfulness and happiness. Consumers are seeking a greater balance through living more fully in the present, practicing gratitude and spending time with family and friends.
The increasing need for connection in an unmoored world was a reoccurring theme at the recent PPG Global Color Workshop. This annual event brings together more than 20 PPG global color stylists from the automotive, consumer electronics, aerospace and home paint and stain industries. Over the course of several days, the stylists analyze the runway, lifestyles, demographics, geographies, and global and cross-cultural societal inspirations to determine what colors will resonate and represent the PPG global color forecast, including the PPG Color of the Year.
PPG paint brand’s 2020 Color of the Year, Chinese Porcelain, is a deep, shaded, orchid blue that instills calmness, reduces anxiety and encourages sleep. This soothing blue imparts slowness, encouraging consumers to practice mindfulness and be more present in their lives while also offering the spirit of hopefulness – a precious commodity in a restless world.
Chinese Porcelain is a rich and traditional hue that provides the perfect, agreeable backdrop for vivacious colors to pop. It also can act as a feature color in a bedroom, enveloping the space and pairing well with crisp white bedding and crown molding to provide a sharp contrast. In the living room space, the hue can be layered with additional blues in tufted and velvet furniture or paired with trending metallic finishes like Hushed Copper (MTL141) from the PPG METALLIC TONES™ collection. Chinese Porcelain also really pops on a front door, especially in New England and in other beach and coastal areas.
We are seeing a lot of people using interior doors as an accent wall. Chinese Porcelain looks gorgeous on an interior or exterior door and is a perfect way for homeowners to introduce more color into their home.
While Chinese Porcelain is recognized as the PPG 2020 Color of the Year, it is also the focal point for the broader PPG 2020 Global Color Trends Forecast. This forecast provides direction and inspiration to architects, designers and homeowners across the hotel, retail and residential markets. PPG’s customers in all business sectors rely on the forecast for new products and color specifications in the architectural, aerospace, automotive and consumer electronic industries.
The colors are brought to life through the following three trend stories, each nestled within the overarching theme of Flow.
On the Move: This upbeat and playful color palette addresses consumers who are looking to remake, reuse and merge cultural influences from different eras, creating a fresh aesthetic that feels simultaneously retro and contemporary. Mismatched hues like PPG paint brand’s Brilliant Blue, Turner’s Yellow and Bleeding Heart deliver joyful color combinations that encourage self-expression from the bold and confident consumer.
At the Core: Taking cues from Mother Nature, this color collection is earthy, botanical and sustainable, resonating with consumers who are looking for a state of balance between long-lasting and purposeful living. These colors evoke comfort and nostalgia, particularly the muted mid-tones. Bright hues such as PPG paint brand’s Crushed Pineapple and Carrot Cake feel rich when contrasted with Comfort, Life Lesson, Cool Concrete and Kangaroo Paw, which double as tinted neutrals.
In the Know: With an emphasis on knowledge, reflection and innovation, this theme represents consumers who are eager to change society while contributing to a future that is better than the past. The palette acknowledges the convergence of technology and earthliness by featuring raw, natural hues like PPG paint brand’s Cinnamon Spice and Brown Clay, as well as organic, oxidized blue-greens like Celestial Blue and Summer Breeze.
