Color Matters…

Imagine this scenario will you.

A girl comes home and opening the door for her is an anxious, waiting mother. As the girl steps in, the mother, obviously impatient, bombards her daughter with rampant questions. “Tell me, what happened? How did it go? Did it go alright?” The daughter, as she slowly and glumly takes off her coat, gives her mother a cheerless puppy look -lower lip flipped- and explains: “Mom…he gave me a flower.” Almost instantly, a gigantic smile begins to stretch across the mother’s face to take up at least three quarters of it while her arms, in rhythm, gradually begin to stretch as well: a huge indication that a maternal hug was inches away.

“But you don’t understand,” the words halt the now almost-in-motion mother, “the flower is not what you think it is!” murmurs the daughter with a twinkling in the corner of her left eye forewarning the birth of a tear. Pausing to try and understand, the mother’s deciphering attempts were futile. The following words, echoed ten times: “Mom, the flower was yellow… ellow… ellow… low… low… ”

Mother and daughter embrace as their tears combine to form a puddle in which they sit to soak, like chicken marinating in sauce, “mourning while absorbing”, a sad, sad day. Moments are what it takes and the maid is recruited from the confines of her next-to-the-kitchen room to huddle in the puddle. For those still wondering where this is heading: Yes, color does matter.

When there were only black and white TVs in the world back in the early 50′s, believe it or not, the world was still in color – I’ve only truly become aware of that fact lucidly just recently. Colors are all around us and they rush into our retinas the minute we spread our eyelids apart. They are part of the natural world and have existed long before we have. The sky has always been blue, the sun always yellow, and the grass always green. It is logically congruent to assume that the way we perceive these colors in this day and age, or the way we have come to anyhow, has been a result of – and can be traced back to – our extrapolations of the contexts in which these colors were visibly inherent in the external environment and the physical world.

Sure, that makes sense. But who gave colors meanings? Who defined that pink was girly, blue was boyish, black was evil, white was peace or purity, and that red was love? Long before language developed and there was no elaborate tool for vocal communication, symbols and colors were used by our illiterate ancestors to express themselves and communicate with others. Colors such as red may have been used to symbolize war, a lurking beast, or danger, by associating the color with blood. Black may have represented the night, which for people without electricity and perhaps not even fire, perhaps meant fear. In this associative method, different colors took take on their different meanings which transformed over the ages as our minds grew more and more intelligent all the way down to us in this day and age. But tracing this all the way back to our non-speaking ancestors may be irrelevant in our case for much human development took place since, and colors, not such a fundamental communication tool for survival anymore, became an ingredient of the world of art.

The relatively modern and scientific-based origins of colors’ meanings can be attributed to our physiology and how we, at the physical and mental levels, interpret colors. More accurately, it is how colors impose emotions by triggering certain neural activity. It gets a little too technical if we dig up more details, but it is a scientific fact that certain colors embody specific emotions. Great artists in our past, for example Van Gogh, have put this science of colors to good use, manifesting different combinations of colors, shades, and tones in his paintings to achieve a desired result. Van Gogh’s paintings are not plainly visual art digested by the eyes, but are pieces that prompt a collection of different emotions resulting from the proper application of the science of colors.

With that all said, when it comes to flowers, surely color has a central role to play. I mean, after all, what is a flower but a compact branch bearing colorful lateral appendages (petals)? So for a quick rough guide for the colors of flowers and what they mean, just to be sure that they are buying the right color for the right occasion, continue reading the brief below.

Flower colors and what they mean:

Red: A red rose is the eternal symbol of love. A popular color all year round, red is particularly associated with Christmas and Valentine’s Day.

Purple: Purple is a natural flower color, and a very popular color for bouquets. It is often interchanged with violet, lilac and indigo tints. A purple rose signifies that the giver has fallen in love with the recipient at first sight.

Orange: Orange flowers are widespread and popular in spring; they are fresh and cheerful, whereas in the fall they are more likely to be associated with the falling leaves.

Yellow: As with most light colors, blooms earliest, so is naturally associated with spring. Spring bouquets frequently feature yellow and white tulips. Yellow daffodils symbolize unrequited love, a yellow rose stands for friendship and yellow flowers are associated with Easter and Passover.

Pink: Pink flowers generally express gratitude and appreciation. Light Pink: Flowers of this color show feelings of admiration and sympathy.

Peach: Peach is a more indefinite color, and peach flowers can signify either sympathy or gratitude.

White: White flowers are popular in spring bouquets, and are strongly featured in bridal work and funeral pieces. White daisies symbolize loyalty in love, and white roses symbolize reverence and humility.

There are many resources both online and in bookshops for people who are interested in learning more about flowers and their meanings. Color only plays a part in the overall equation. Other factors include flower type, size, and presentation. For instance, a single red flower, lets say, is not the same as a bunch of red ones.

Apparently, there seems to be an entire science dedicated to this. So we will pass on going into specifics and details and we’ll leave that a quest for those with interest. But even with that said a very general concept has been delivered in brevity: color matters. So a little more enlightened, as you may now be, if it should ever happen that you find yourself in a flower shop with a hasty shopkeeper, madly fashioning a bouquet of different colored flowers, you now possess the essential knowledge to stop him and select flowers of colors that will best suit the occasion and reflect your intentions.