Naming colors
the collection of a lifetime...
Hello,
Here’s a cooling thought experiment to soothe your overheated, possibly summer-weary self. I hope you’ll play along — don’t worry, you don’t have to lift a finger. I collect color names and I think you should too. It’s a very practical collection and there’s very little dusting. Mine is a collection of a lifetime as I know I’ll never accumulate them all.
It’s nearly impossible to remember a color, but when color, memory, and association collide, our fluency with color improves — for that we need language. Naming specifies and enlarges our perception of color. And it’s fun. It puts us into conversation with others. For instance, at a glance you might describe the images above as mostly purple and green, and you wouldn’t be wrong.
But if you tell me you see ultramarine, amethyst, the color of a night sky or an old-fashioned streetlight, a rare sapphire, lavender, grape, cerulean, lime and avocado—you help me distinguish nuance and detail. You help me to see more fully.
I’m so glad you’re here.
xo Lorene
In the works
The 2025 edition of my Living Color calendar is gathering momentum for another circle around the sun. I’m sorting images, thoughtfully trying to select the best one for each month, and working with my in-house designer (hi Honey) on the layout.
Calendar orders will launch in late August. I’ll be sending a special pre-sale offer and discount code to all subscribers, that’s you~, in a few weeks. Preorders save you money and they help me plot and plan.These limited-edition print calendars are my love letter to the natural world and an encouragement to pay attention to every passing moment.
Recent writing: Wolf Willow, Flowers, Farmers and Friends, on Garden Rant. How a scrubby plant with a taunting alpine fragrance that floats on a breeze became a botanical totem for a gathering of people who celebrate and cherish the art and craft of flowers.
Recent reading: Natural Color, by Sasha Duerr. I’ve got a load of avocado skins and pits in the deep freeze and am looking forward to this year’s garden dye project. You’ll find this beautiful read along many more title for gardeners, cooks and maker in my Bookshop storefront.
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Color my World
The chamomile is blooming. I’ll harvest it for this year’s batch of Garden Tea—a mix of whatever flavorful leaf or flower I can harvest from my 2024 plot. So far I’ve harvested sweet woodruff, anise hyssop, spearmint, rose petals and basil. Chamomile will add a sweet flavor to my herbal blend
Creating color studies is like a dopamine drip! Deee-LIGHT-ful — and given the number of pollinators all over the blossoms I reckon they feel the same way.
Asclepius speciosa—showy milkweed
Nothing wrong with being a late bloomer. I’m pleasantly surprised that this anemone is still flowering through the heat we’ve had. Typically Anemone coronaria is a decidedly spring bloom that feigns dormancy when temperatures reach 70F. No complaining from me, although the vase life was shorter than usual. Typically the last nearly a couple of weeks but the house has been warm, plenty of complaining from me.
Plums, generously shared with me by a garden friend were destined for a small batch of black pepper infused jelly —> The plums however had other thoughts and refused to gel. So I’m thinking I’ll add vinegar and age for a sweet/tart and beautifully colored shrub. UPDATE: Said non jelly has been supplemented with Champagne vinegar and is resting in the refrigerator to soften the sharp flavors. In a few weeks we’ll mix it with soda water, sparkling wine, or in cocktails for a taste (and color) of summer.
I have a garden mullet. Perennially serious and collected it the front, total color party for cutting in the back. Candy striped ‘Velouette’ cosmos is a surprise hit this year with its circus-tent petals.
Dreaming of the life aquatic… I think I have a mermaid in my garden. Or maybe I’m spending too much time at the end of hose during this dry season.
Usually this plant blooms in my garden in spring through early summer, but last winter’s deep freeze laid waste to all the volunteer seedlings I’ve come to rely on. Fortunately, a single stray seedling showed up this month among the perennials. Thank goodness for the resilience of seed.
Honeywort (Cerinthe major purpurascens)
What’s your favorite color?
Finding color chimes in bits and pieces of Blupleurum flowers and Hypericum berries. Yesterday I got lost for hours in organizing my 4-inch paintings. At the end of the day I had a collection 30 color stories made up of nine paintings each. It made me so happy.
As a child my favorite color was coral because my mother always told me that it was a good color for me to wear. In my teen years my favorite was Campbell soup tomato red. I lived in my red stage well into my late fifties. Now, at 68, i relish soft gray blues, warm grays and pearly whites. Kind of like the oyster shell colors you paint. These colors help to sooth and relax me in this crazy world of constant activity. My birth name is Margaret which means "pearl". Having survived so much trauma throughout my life, I like to think that I am now in my pearl stage. The oyster has done its work and has revealed its pearl of great price.
My favorite color is the Seahawks’ marine blue . Yes, it reminds me of he timelessness of the Salish Sea, the eternity of boundless water, and the exquisite nature of love, loss which I daily experience as I slog thru m husband’s advanced stages of vascular dementia!