COLOR ME HUNGRY!

Does anyone else detect a conspiracy here – or am I just overly sensitive and irritable because I’ve recently cut my calorie intake?  Here’s the issue: I would never have thought that the paint industry would be in cahoots with the food industry – but I think it may be so!

A friend who visited recently asked me if I had ever blogged about the fact that every paint color I chose for my house is named for a food. I hadn’t thought about it much. I like themes and it tickled me at the time. But as she is a psychologist, I thought it wise to think about it some more.

I have Sherwin Williams’ “Tomato” on our front door. The dining room is “Habanero Chili.” The living room is “Hubbard Squash.” The kitchen and hallways are various tones of the same color named, “Portabella,” “Tea Chest,” and “Kaffee.” If they had paint called “Strip Steak” it would harmonize nicely with this scheme and would have completed the "meal", but Sherwin Williams’ nomenclature stays pretty much within the vegetarian range.

As a former interior designer (or does anyone ever truly shed this profession from their psyche?) and design educator, I have long been aware of the tenets of color psychology. Part science, part intuition, its theories are put to work in all kinds of applications. For example, most famously, as most of you know, in fast food restaurants vibrant reds and oranges are used to speed along the dining process. But did you also know that red is thought to enhance appetite?  Apparently so, making it a most suitable color choice for a dining room – especially one with a spicy name like “Habanero Chili”!  Admit it! Your taste buds are watering just reading this, aren’t they?

Conversely, blue is considered an appetite suppressant. Interesting. It stands to reason, then, that guests at a dinner party in a blue room might save the hosts considerably on serving sizes. (Did I hear you yawn and move your plate away?)

Now, when we also think about how unconscious impulses are exercised in making choices, (remember that Freud once said, “there are no accidents!”) I guess it is no surprise that my choice of color names could well have come out of their relation to my most favorite pastime in the world – eating!

But what does this say about the nefarious motives of the paint industry? Are they in on the conspiracy to keep America fat? Are they in the food industry’s pocket to help ratchet up food sales? We already know that TV and magazines are in on that one. A commercial for Jenny Craig will be closely followed by one telling you how you can up-size your meal at Denny’s or wherever. Talk about mixed messages! So, are paint colors named to boost our appetites? Can one ever hope to resist feasting with gusto surrounded by a red called “Habanero Chili”?

All of America is talking about weight loss and I’m on an exercise/nutrition kick these days. So, I don’t need my paint colors working against me!  Therefore, I propose that the paint industry help us out. Help us deny our appetites and suppress our culinary urges! Get us up and moving! How about redubbing the 2012 colors with vigorous, active names, like, “Sweat Sock White”? Or “Gym Floor Tan”? Or “Running Track Red”? We need to lobby the paint companies!

Who’s with me on this?