Welcome! This article is a part of Crafted Colour – Practical Colour Theory for Craft series, which is aimed at helping you develop your Colour Confidence and Craft with Colour. Today you will learn about the connection between Colour and Mood.

The Internet, and Pinterest in particular, is full of lovely info graphics and charts about the psychology of colour. Studies have been carried out detailing the power colour has to affect out moods and emotions. Colour charts, such as the one below, can help you to choose a colour and mood to start your craft project with.

Let’s say I’ve decided to create a wall hanging like this one for my family room. I want it to make me feel  fun, light and summer-y. Looking at various charts like the one above I could choose yellow-green (fun, uplifting cheerful), turquoise (fresh, fun, summer-y) or even pink (sweet happy youthful). I can then choose a colour scheme, maybe split complementary with white as a neutral to keep it light. (Remember the Colour Schemes are Complementary, Split Complementary, Triadic, Tetradic, Monochromatic and Analogous.)

Then, consider if you need to add a Neutral (black, grey white etc) and play with the Colour Values. That’s all there is to it really.

So, what’s in store for the remainder of the month? Join me for some I Spy games using the Colour Schemes mentioned above and then we can have fun creating with some colour palettes.

Welcome! This article is a part of Crafted Colour – Practical Colour Theory for Craft series, which is aimed at helping you develop your Colour Confidence and Craft with Colour. Today you will learn about Triadic and Tetradic Colour Schemes.

Triadic

Triadic colour schemes use three colours equally spaced around the Colour Wheel. Primary colours together are Triadic, as are Secondary colours. It is a popular colour scheme because it has strong visual contrast and balance without being too overpowering. This colour scheme give you four different palette choices primary (red, yellow and blue), secondary (orange, green and violet) and two tertiary (yellow-orange, red-violet, blue-green) (yellow-green, red-orange, blue-violet).

To use a Triadic colour scheme choose one colour to dominate. If the colours are too vibrant try using tones of the colours instead.

Tetradic

Tetradic colour schemes are also known as Double Complementary because they combine two sets of Complementary colours. Known as the richest of colour schemes it is also the hardest to achieve balance and harmony. When using this colour scheme chose one colour to dominate and keep the others in more subdued tones. Always watch the balance between warm and cool colours.

This wraps up the theory part of the series. Join me next while I examine the moods associated with particular colours.

Welcome! This article is a part of Crafted Colour – Practical Colour Theory for Craft series, which is aimed at helping you develop your Colour Confidence and Craft with Colour. Today you will learn why you need to know about Analogous and Monochromatic colour schemes.

Analogous

Analogous colours are closely related colours and found next to each other on the colour wheel. They are usually calm and harmonious and are found most commonly in nature. For example blue-green, green and yellow-green.

The key to using an Analogous colour scheme is to select one colour as the main colour, a second colour to support and the third colour (with a neutral) to accent. So in the example below I could use the red-violet as my main colour, a tint of red (pink) as the support colour and a shade of red-orange with a neutral colour to accent. (More on neutral colours later.)

You can see I’ve included a pure colour, a tone and a tint in the Monochromatic chart. You could choose all tints or shades or a mixture of all the Colour Values.

Monochromatic

The word monochromatic literally means one (mono) and colour (chroma). So, a Monochromatic colour scheme is one single colour, which includes its tints, shades and tones. For example you could have a colour palette made up of pale blue (a tint), pure blue (the primary colour) navy blue (the shade) and blue-grey (a tone). But, as I mentioned in Tint Shade and Tone, adding black to a colour to get a shade may change the colour (see the middle yellow colour in the graphic above).

Next, we wrap up Part 3 of Colour Schemes with Triadic and Tetradic colour combinations.

Welcome! This article is a part of Crafted Colour – Practical Colour Theory for Craft series, which is aimed at helping you develop your colour confidence and craft with colour. Today you will learn about complementary colours.

So by now you should be familiar with the parts of a Colour Wheel. Now I’m going to show you some…not rules but I’ll call them guides to help you create a Colour Scheme.

Complementary Colours

Colours that are directly opposite each other on the colour wheel are known as Complementary Colours. For example Red and green, violet (or purple if you prefer) and yellow, blue-green and red-orange.

Complementary colours are considered high contrast, creating visual tension. They must be used carefully, especially as pure colours. Use complimentary colours when you want something to pop! You’ll find a lot of Complementary Colours in product packaging on the supermarket shelves.

Split Complementary

Split-complementary colours are considered gentler versions of complementary colours but still retain their “pop” factor. In addition to the main colour it uses two colours immediately adjacent to its direct complementary colour. For example red and green are complementary colours, green with red-orange and red-purple are split-complementary colours.

A split-complementary colour scheme is considered the easiest and most effective of all the combinations. This colour scheme, teamed with a neutral colour, or a tint of the main colour, is my go-to choice for most of my craft projects.

Next up we’re looking at Analogous and Monochromatic colours.

Welcome! This article is a part of Crafted Colour – Practical Colour Theory for Craft series, which is aimed at helping you develop your colour confidence and craft with colour. Today you will learn about warm and cool colours.

The colours in the Colour Wheel can be separated into two types. Warm colours and cool colours.

Warm

Warm colours are created with red, orange and yellow and are active and full of energy. They remind us of sunlight, heat and happiness and seem to appear closer and stand out more readily.

Cool

On the other side of the colour wheel are the cool colours, made with blue, green and violet. Cool colours are calm, soothing and sometimes sad and remind us of water, sea and sky.

Both types of colours should be used when creating a colour scheme. For example, if your want your craft project to appear warm and full of energy it is important to use small amounts of cool colour to create balance and contrast. When creating a colour scheme or colour palette for your project it is important to consider the mood you want to convey. Knowing about Warm and Cool Colours is the first step.

Did you just see me sneak in the first rule of creating a colour scheme ? In case you missed it.

Next up are two types of Complementary Colour Schemes.