Warm/Cool Contrast

Color TemperatureThe tendency of certain colors to read as warm (red)

or cool (blue).

Warm Colors

• Are colors associated with fire.• Hues in the ‘red’ section of the color-wheel

are considered warm colors– orange, red-violet, yellow are all considered ‘warm’ colors

• Warm colors TEND to be stimulating, especially red.

Red Sitting Room, David Hicks, Interior Designer

Luis Ortega, Interior Desiner

Wolf Kahn

Cool Colors

• Are blue-based colors—blue, green, blue-violet

• These colors suggest water and trees• They tend to be soothing and relaxing.

• Most Americans claim to prefer blues and green

Helen Frankenthaler

Peter Dunham, Interior Design

Anonymous Interior Design

Colors on the ‘red’ half of the color wheel tend to read as warm.Colors on the ‘blue’ half of the color wheel tend to read cool.

This is relative, not absolute!!

• Red-Orange is the warmest Hue• Blue-green, the coolest

• Studies show that color temperature may be linked to the experience of actual temperature.

• Subjects in a red-orange room reported feeling cold once the temperature hit 52 degrees

• In a blue-green room they reported feeling cold at 59 degrees

Notice how the same red-violet in the first square of both scales reads warm OR cool depending on the context.

PMS 219 (base color-Rubine Red) PMS 205 (one part yellow added) PMS 217 (one part Rubine red+30 parts white)

These colors all fall under the ‘red’ rubric. Which seems warmest?

Pierre Bonnard

Contrast of warm and cool colors in a composition

Pierre BonnardWarmer colors seem to extend toward the viewer. Cooler colors recede into the distance

Donald Sultan, PoppiesWarmer colors seem larger and closer, cooler colors seem smaller and farther

Graham Nickson, BathersNotice how the warm/cool contrast causes the reds and yellows to ‘pop’

Claude Monet, Houses of Parliament in Fog

Most of these colors are ‘reds’ which elements of the room read as ‘warmer’ and which as ‘cooler’ colors.?

Peter Doig, Ski Jump

By adding blue to both the reds and the yellows, Doig has created a composition that reads as ‘cool’ despite only using traditionally ‘warm’ colors.

Graham Nickson