The best explanation of context that I’ve ever heard was this one: Take a stick; in the forest, it actually is a stick, in mathematics however, it’s a 1, and in the alphabet, it’s an l.
Therefore, colour is all about context. That’s why you cannot call a colour cool or warm unless you are comparing it to another colour. Why? Because you can always find a warmer one and you can always find a cooler one, it just depends which way you are going on the colour wheel.
Same goes for greens. If I just pull out a fresh green colour, they will say – "but that’s mint green!!" So then I show a mint green and compare that to the one I’m recommending, then they get it.
How about grays? There are a million of them, some that are warm and sophisticated, and some that are as cold as an icy winter’s day. So, if I am standing in a bathroom (for example) and looking at tiles that I can see have some warm taupy gray tones in it like this one:
I often get the “it’s too gray” response. Until I go to my gray deck and pull out a cold blue gray like this one:
Make sure you compare especially when you are choosing whites! Take the white you are considering and compare it with the whitest, white in the deck, OC-65 Chantilly Lace or Decorator White, or Ultra White. Now you can see what you are doing!
Related posts:
The Difference Between an Experienced Colourist and a Novice
