Listen to me for a Secondary

HAPPY HALLOWEEN my ghouly, witchy, batty friends! I hope that your day is full of candy eating, spooky sighting, and letting go of any inhibitions and just going crazy (in the area of costumes…not in anything else. Don’t get too wild my children). Sadly I am not able to partake in any celebrations, as I have to go to class at the wretched time of 7-9:30 pm. It’s just dreadful. However, as I like to think of myself as a rather optimistic person–despite a certain cynicism that I can't seem to shake off–I thought that I could use this opportunity to my advantage and teach you all a lesson. This is not one of those “teach you lesson” things like when the bully on the playground teaches the scared kindergarteners a lesson by taking their lunch money and tying their shoelaces together. No, I want to actually teach you something because I find it fascinating. You see, the class I have tonight is called “Color and Design for Fashion”. In this class we learn all about the theory of color and what color is and what different color combinations are and pretty much everything about color. It is a lot more complicated than you would think. However, it is incredibly relevant because whether or not you are aware of it, color is all around us and has a profound impact on our lives. You’ve probably had an experience where you saw a color and it made you feel something. Like peaceful when you see a light blue, or happy when you see a bright yellow. There are individual colors, but then when you combine these colors a whole new world arises. Different color combinations mean different things. For example, when you see green and red together, most of us think of Christmas. Why do we think of Christmas? It’s a little silly really. It’s just two colors. A combination of two pigments. Nothing complicated. It’s not like they are images of the birth of Christ. Nevertheless, we see these colors and all of a sudden “Jingle Bells” is ringing in our heads.

Another example, today, Halloween, you may notice a large amount of orange, green, and purple together. Such as these Halloween m&m's

Or this little girl's Halloween witch costume

These could be strongly saturated (very vibrant, like they came straight off of the color wheel), they could be muted (more earthy tones), or they could be desaturated (darker or lighter by the addition of white or black). This color combination is called the “secondary color triad”. This is simply because it is a triad (three) made up of the secondary colors on the color wheel. 

Secondary colors are made when mixing two primary colors. Orange= red + yellow, Purple= blue + red, Green= blue + yellow. WOW! It’s like math! This is so exciting!

I’m not quite sure when or why or how these colors became associated with Halloween and fall time, however I do have a theory. Two actually. One, because these colors seem quite witchish. Orange for their wrinkled, old skin. Green for the toads they use in their spells.  Purple for their magical cloaks and the vapors that come off of their potions. Just watch Hocus Pocus and it will all become clear.

There is another reason though, as to why we these colors come into style every October-November. When I see these colors I automatically think of fall. That's because in autumn these secondary colors occur in nature. They may not appear exactly as they do on the color wheel, but instead we see them in muted forms. 

Orange is the color of pumpkins, falling leaves, the ground after the grass has begun to die, and most importantly, the color of pumpkin pie.

Green is the color of the leaves as they are changing, it isn't the vibrant green of spring but a duller green, a green that is beginning to turn brown. It is the color of green apples, the kind that make amazing apple pies.

Purple is the color of thistles, one of the only flowers that stay blooming through fall. Not to mention the purple foods that we eat at this time such as aubergines (eggplant), purple potatoes and red cabbage, at least I eat a lot of those foods at this time. And of course red pears! Which can be made into pie!

So essentially, these colors are the colors of PIE! and we eat pie in the fall and therefore these colors are fall colors.

Have a Happy Halloween

In honor of the day, I am wearing an outfit of secondary colors (pumpkin not included)
Green Sweater from Anthropologie
Shorts from Calvin Klein
Purple tights from Target
Orangish brown suede booties from Clarks

xoxo

Justice