I am not a fan of colour trends. What I mean by that is that I think sometimes there is an urge to generate new colour schemes twice a year which feels a little forced to me. And it is one of the reasons why we over consumer. This is particularly the case with clothes where – in the UK in particular – we buy clothes far too often. Our consumption of textiles is generally not sustainable.

But that said, I am not saying that there is no such thing as colour trends. Certain colours – and colour combinations – become desirable at certain times and I don’t think the whole thing is artificially generated. I just think the changes are not as rapid as the colour forecasting industry would have us believe.

But I am old enough to remember the 70s and I remember well the desirability of brown and olive green bathroom suites, for example. Nobody would use these colours as the basis of their interior design colour schemes today — would they?

Well, today I read that brown is replacing dark blue as a favoured colour for interiors when a moody dramatic look is the aim. The article in Livingetc suggests that the use of brown – a more muted colour – is more natural in its feel and that sales of brown-hued paint are rising. There are some interesting examples of the use of brown in the online article.