Colour: Yellow

The last primary colour is yellow..... sunshine!

In the UK at the moment the sun has been missing in rain for a very long time... we had a glimpse of it on Sunday.... but now we are back in a world of rain clouds and water....

So to cheer everyone up lets look at yellow as a colour!

Yellow is the colour of butter, bananas, gold and sunshine!

It is a colour that always makes me smile.

Like red and blue, there are lots of shades of yellow:

As a colour it represents reason, optimism, pleasure and happiness - you only have to think how to feel on a sunny day.On a sunny day the whole world feels like a much better place!

But it also has negative connections too. It is associated with cowardice, envy, jealousy and betrayal. Yellow as the colour of cowardice since the 19th century, but the exact reason it is associated with cowardice is not known.

In China it has major significance as it is the colour of happiness, glory and wisdom. It is a masculine colour.

Colour: Red

Module 3 of the City and Guilds is all about Colour.

I love colour and I am fascinated by the development of the colours we now take for granted today. How did the colour lilac develop? Where does Cerulean Blue come from?

So I thought I would start a series investigating colour, working from the 3 primary colours of red, yellow and blue, then looking at secondary and tertiary colours...

It will help me build colour ideas and palettes for my design work, a kind of online mood board...

So starting with red...

Red is the colour of blood, strawberries and ladybirds. It is a sign of danger - think of stop signs - all over the world. It is vibrant and represents passion, desire and energy.

When you think of the first world war it the red poppies that spring to mind and rivers of bed blood that flowed through France.

In Eastern cultures it represents happiness. My youngest came home from school yesterday with a red Chinese packet with sweets for the Chinese New Year. The red envelope symbolizes good luck and is to ward off evil.

Red is my favourite colour and used to be my mums. When she passed away she had a red coffin and everyone had to wear red to the funeral... that would have made her smile!

Gotta love a pair of red shoes!