Pantone has unveiled its 2024 Color of the Year—Peach Fuzz (13-1023), which it called a “velvety gentle peach tone whose all-embracing spirit embraces the mind, body, and soul.”
JCK contributing editor Amy Elliott cites many possible applications for the color in jewelry. “We may see the color surface in the use of morganite, Malaia peach garnets, peach moonstone, and if you’re fancy, Melo Melo pearls,” she says.
In a webinar, Laurie Pressman, vice president of the Paramus, N.J.–based Pantone Color Institute, said the 25th annual choice was influenced by the “unusual time we continue to find ourselves living in. As we enter 2024, how we live and the concept of lifestyle has taken on new meaning.”
Pressman said a good word for the color is “heartfelt,” and that people can “draw comfort” from it.
The hue conjures “a feeling of kindness and tenderness, [and] a message of caring and sharing, community and collaboration,” she added. “This is a warm and cozy shade that highlights a desire for togetherness with others, or enjoying a moment of stillness and the feeling of sanctuary this creates. It’s a color that brings belonging, inspires calibration and an opportunity for nurturing.”
The color, Pressman said, also speaks “to a new modernity: It’s sensitive but it’s sweet and airy. While it is centered in that human and tactile experience of enriching the mind, body, and soul, it’s also on the flip side a quietly sophisticated and contemporary peach hue with depth whose gentle lightness is understated but impactful.”
Elliott says, “The last time I was in New York City, I noticed a lot of shell pink and dusty rose wrap coats, and it just looked really chic. I’d place Peach Fuzz in this palette—not quite a pastel, but soft and romantic. My mind goes to someone opening a chest in their great-great-aunt’s attic and discovering a gown of watered silk in a faded apricot hue. I see a winter sunset with this shade of peach shining through clouds of smoky violet.”
A roundtable of New York Times reporters noted that Pantone’s pick for 2023, Viva Magenta, seemed to presage the popularity of Barbie pink. But they weren’t sure that would happen next year with Peach Fuzz.
“Every year Pantone seems to really lean into the idea that color can set the emotional tone for a year,” said reporter Jessica Testa. “Like, the world is unceasingly dark and gloomy, so here’s a pastel to cheer everyone up.”
Added staff editor Jeremy Allen: “With social media forcing everyone to pick sides, sling slogans, and make sweeping pronouncements, maybe a quiet, neither-here-nor-there color with just a hint of cheekiness—peach emoji, anyone?—is just what we need right now.”
Additional reporting by Melissa Rose Bernardo
(Photo courtesy of Pantone)
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