"Color is life: for a world without colors appears to us as dead. Colors are primordial ideas, children of the aboriginal colorless light and its counterpart, colorless darkness. As flame begets light, so light engenders colors. Colors are the children of light, and light is their mother. Light, that first phenomenon of the world, reveals to us the spirit and living soul of the world through colors.”

Johannes Itten,
Elements of Color, 1970

HUE
The name of the color such as red, blue, orange.

VALUE
The lightness or darkness of a color; the amount of white or black in the color.

INTENSITY
The purity or a color; how little or how much of another hue is mixed with the primary hue.

THE COLOR WHEEL is divided by color chords as a basis for combining different colors.

COLOR EXTENSION
The relative power of a color to create a visual impact in the space. Some colors are naturally more powerful than others. A little bit of one color, such as yellow, can balance a lot of another color, such as purple.

Yellow extends more than purple.

Orange extends more than blue.




Red and green extend about equally.



Tip: The small colors on a paint fan are all equal size so you cannot tell how a color will extend in your home. The small squares of a color will look duller and lighter than the whole wall, or room of that color.

MONOCHROMATIC
One color in different values (light to dark) or different intensities (dull to bright).

This simple color chord can be flat if there is not enough contrast.

TWO COLOR CHORD
Two hues used together.

The most balanced color chord is a warm/cool contrast created by complementary colors (colors directly opposite each other on the color wheel), for example yellow-green with red-violet.

THREE COLOR CHORD
Three colors connected by an equilateral triangle (3 colors equidistant apart) or by an isosceles triangle (one color plus two colors on each side of its complement). For example, yellow with blue-violet and red-violet.

The three color chord softens the most extreme contrast inherent in complementary colors.

FOUR COLOR CHORD
Choose colors connected by a square (4 colors equidistant apart) or by rectangle (4 colors immediately adjacent to two complements). For example, yellow-green and yellow-orange with blue-violet and red-violet.

This is a complex color chord often found with one of the hues being dominant. Used in fabrics and rugs where the less dominant colors can be used as accents and accessories.