A Colour Palette Methodology

This paper presents “The Colour Combination Cards”; a method collection for design students to be used in the creation of colour palettes. Since a design process is influenced and controlled by various methods, this project suggests using a defined methodology in the work with colour palettes in order to give more variety to the design of colour schemes. The methodology is presented to the studentsas method cards that can be combined and applied in their design work.
The methods are divided into four categories: Plan, Create, Adjust and Review. None of the methods are conclusive but indicate possible approaches to colour work. All graphical design is made in black and white so no colour combinations are indirectly proposed. The colour work in a design process begins with considering the desired expression or the intention with the colour scheme. The Plan category represents this starting point and consists of five cards, each presenting a goal for the colour palette and suggesting possible tactics. The Plan cards propose Create and Adjust methods that can be used to achieve the desired colour expression. The Create category consists of twelve different methods to create a colour palette. The methods vary from quite practical and intuitive to completely systematic methods based on theories of colour harmonies. The Adjust category consists of twelve methods. The methods are used to elaborate the created palette, to experiment and refine and are as such representing the iterations known in design processes. The final category Review present a series of questions to be used when evaluating the colour palette. The paper concludes by presenting two cases where “The Colour Combination Cards” have been applied in colour classes as well as a discussion on future work.