Color Flows Through Us with Judith van Vliet
Image courtesy of Spur Magazine
The following article was originally published in SPUR magazine in my Tomorrow column.
As we explore wellbeing in 2025, I sat down with colour visionary Judith Van Vliet, founder of The Colour Authority. She is more than a colour expert—she's a catalyst for transformation. Through her podcast, consulting, workshops and Color Marketing Group leadership, she shapes the colour narratives for leading brands by unlocking colour's deep social, psychological and emotional powers.
Geraldine Wharry: My first question is one you always start with your podcast guests: What is colour?
Judith Van Vliet: Colour for me is my main way of living. It is what I do each and every day from the morning until the evening. I’m very lucky to be so passionate about colour and be able to work with it. So, for me, colour is everything: life, my constant companion every day and on every project I do.
GW: In your interview with Ruxandra Duru, she talked about colour being in the belly and gut. I remember when I worked with colour as a fashion designer, my taste buds would start watering! Colour has such a deep physical and emotional impact on us. How you integrate this in your work?
JVV: There's a lot of talk about colour's effects on wellbeing and emotions - every brand is open to exploring it. But there's still a gap. People are aware but aren't implementing the wellbeing part of colour, except for some great designers.
“You can’t separate wellbeing, emotions from colour psychology. Take yellow - it connects to intuition and critical thinking through the amygdala, and through our third eye chakra to our gut feeling. Designers totally get this intuitive aspect. For marketing managers, because it’s intangible, it’s more challenging, so I often back-up with market data.”
When I work with clients, I connect to the 'why'. Yes, it's always market-related, but I tap into colour psychology because it affects our emotions alongside cultural associations. There is no such thing as selecting a colour because it's trendy without research or storytelling. You look at trends but you look at the psychology, associations, and what wellbeing means in that specific culture or market.
GW: Someone on your podcast said colour is opportunity for change. Imagine if you were completely free to do whatever you want with colour to drive positive change in the world, what would that look like for you?
JVV: It's a big question. I think of the best colour that drives conviviality and respect, community, conversation, and empathy, because these are crucial topics for the next years to come and we're lacking them. It's probably an orange, because orange is the colour of communication. As the warmest colour on the spectrum, it's enthusiastic and we need energy because we're drained over so many things that are happening in the world. For that reason, orange will be a colour that can drive that much needed community feeling of working together.
GW: In your interview with Anna Starmer of Luminary Colour, you discussed wiser and longer-term choices around colour. Trends have gotten tricky to navigate. There is this sense that colour is purely an aesthetic choice, versus a more vibrational choice. How do you navigate that tension of working with colour trends in the current landscape?
JVV: The industry is shifting - we've moved from seasonal to annual colour trends, and now, especially in architecture, we're looking at two-year cycles. Trends are definitely slowing down, and that's where the future of colour is going. My consultancy is gradually moving away from trends, yet many people still don't understand trends. They'll just put Mocha, the 2025 colour of the year on everything, and that's not going to work.
What we're doing now is carrying over certain colours. From a palette of 36 colours, perhaps 6 are reoccurring from previous collections. This gives certainty to consumers, architects and designers - these aren't timeless, but they're longevity colours.
“My work is about shifting that view on trends - more macro, less micro. With my clients, I actually work less with trends now - they only make up about 10% of the work. The rest is about the brand itself. What does the brand stand for? What’s their mission and future, and how can that be translated through colours? What’s their heritage? ”
Many brands are reconnecting with their origins - who they are as a company, as a brand. It's about creating a colour palette that's coherent with that storytelling over a longer period.
For people in fashion, I'm not saying don't follow trends, but be careful with what you personally resonate with.
GW: The habit of following any viral trend dictate blindly has caused a cultural backlash around trends. The word trend itself is getting a bad reputation, which is sad because now everyone wants to move away from trends but understanding them is really important.
JVV: They are important, but for example, with the Super Bowl and Kendrick Lamar's performance, everybody's talking about the jeans he was wearing. I can really imagine every 14, 15-year-old tossing away whatever jeans they have right now in their closets for this latest silhouette. This is the issue because the bigger picture was that hidden revolution that Lamar was trying to evoke in a country that's not willing to change.
Parting Thoughts
Colour is surprise and joy. Each colour is a vibration and energy - a constant companion in our increasingly digital world. Colour remains Judith's "way of living", through guidance and collaboration with a global community of innovators, brands and people. As colour psychology and wellbeing rise to prominence, my key takeaway from this conversation is that we will increasingly understand that authentic connection to colour runs far deeper than trends.
By Geraldine Wharry
