Color Trends - Look For Comfort & Hope

One of the hardest things about home decor can be choosing a color scheme for your home design. We often study color samples for hours, hoping for inspiration for a design that will seem fresh and hold up for at least a year or two.

Certain designers known as color forecasters say that home decor colors often reflect Americans' national mood. For instance, during the Great Depression a lot of gray and mauve was seen in area rugs, upholstery and carpets as the country struggled with massive joblessness and economic woes.

This year colors have returned to a neutral palette, mainly in response to the many problems America faces these days: economic recession, war on two fronts, health care reform and so on. It's the color equivalent of comfort food: safe and familiar.

At the same, however, this neutral palette is being lit up with sparks of bright colors, especially crimson, acid green and yellow and amethyst.

Brown, which has been a mainstay of color for several years, is starting to wane in 2009. Instead of deep chocolate brown in upholstery and area rugs, lighter shades such as tan, beige, mocha and caramel are being used. Also on its way out is the combination of brown and blue.

As the browns start to fade out, designs say that the color gray appears to be on the upswing. As a foundation color, gray spans a range of hues from soft dove gray to dusky charcoal to deep hematite. Gray also holds its own when jazzed up with pearlescent and metallic accents.

Green, the color of eco-friendly design, also is growing in popularity in nearly every shade. Some designers predict it will be found in everything from curtains, area rugs and upholsetery to kitchen and bathroom countertops.

European home decor has centered on black-and-white designs recently, and this trend has begun to make its way to America. Coupled with this combination of opposites are accents of acid green, red and pink. These last two colors are hues that Americans associate with causes, such as red for HIV/AIDS and pink for breast cancer, so their use in home design also gives a new resonance of social responsibility that matches the national mood.

Violet has popped up in accessories as a surprise crossover color from the Goth trend among high school teens. Yes, that purple-black on your daughter's nail polish and eyeliner is turning respectable, moving into such hues as wine, true purple and violet. These deeper, edgier shades are pushing out recent affinities for softer lavender in home decor.

So what's not on the color horizon? Experts say that bright, sunny yellows are out, along with orange. Maybe they remind us too much of global warming. However, gold is expected to be seen in all kinds of elegant decor, possibly in response to the money we've lost over the past year n the recession.

One good thing especially about the neutral palette that's holding sway over home decor right now: It provides a good foundation for whatever kind of accessorizing you choose to do.