The Painted Hand

Organic Fall Shades

In my opinion I think these colors are a good update to traditional Fall colors. Beautiful yellow-toned colors of Ochre and Saffron become interesting when paired together and instead of a typical bright red, there is a muddled tomato color combined with a the dulled blue. I think it is a lovely twist to Fall! I think these colors are also great because they were created with organic paints. I ran across this project in Central Park last year for Earth Day and there were literally hundreds of kid paintings all lined up - it was very inspiring.... Photos by me

Inspecting the Sidewalk

I'm back from my trip and am ready to dive back into this blog. I hope my readers will continue to check in more often as I promise to have tons of color eye candy for you all to get creative with. So, to get into the swing of things I discovered to never underestimate the little things you might find from looking down at your feet. When I was in San Francisco this past week (which was oh so fun!) I was waiting in line to go to the SFMoMA and found myself standing on this sewer lid that had scrapes of color all over it.  I told Lish to go ahead in line and let me take pictures of the sewer as I was so captivated by it.  I'm sure people thought it strange, but I can't help but snap pics of unexpected color happenings. I also really loved the patterns the octagon shapes made.  So, don't forget to glance in all directions when walking about and to really zoom in on random things that may hold many treasures for you. 

Shades of Montreal

<

So, as I mentioned earlier I went to Canada in June for work and had a great time wondering the streets of Montreal and Toronto in search of emerging fashion trends. With two cameras in tow I managed to take a lot of pictures, and discovered many colorful little treasures mixed in with all the mood photography I was taking for work. My first stop was Montreal and have to say, I was really amazed with all the shades I found in their architecture. I hope you enjoy!

50th Post!

Hello to all of my fabulous readers! I am finally back after a month's hiatus and what a better way to get back in the swing of things by making it my 50th post! My new job has been taking up a bunch of my time (in a good way), but because of it The Painted Hand has been neglected. I have had a bunch of new ideas and been taking lots of pictures during my absence and will start to get them posted. So thank you to all of you who have continued to check in! I will be traveling to Montreal and Toronto this week for work, and will hopefully get some cool pictures from there. So stay tuned for that soon! These photos were taken a few weeks ago at Anthropologie. I loved the kaleidoscope beetle creations, but what really caught my eye was the slight use of watercolor to add a dash of color to the designs. They had a dusty feel to them and I especially liked the smoky tomato red with the teal and golden hue. I have seen a lot of bug/insect imagery in fashion and home design and think this is a refreshing way, especially since it also reminds me of lace . Enjoy!

Brushstrokes

Stumbled upon people painting in Central Park this weekend to celebrate earth day and then saw the Bergdorf windows afterwards where some of the dresses had painterly patterns to them. This is sort of an odd combination of colors to pair together, but I think that's why I like it. As a color forecaster part of my job is to create unusual color pairings that some of society might view as odd...and then eventually they come around and see that it's not so bad afterall. For this palette I love whitened lime green with the grey/taupe and the little dash of pale orange and brick red.

On a side note, I found out that I will be traveling to Montreal, Toronto, Mexico, Peru, Columbia and other parts of South America for my job this year! I'm so excited and hope to document any interesting color palettes that I find to post on the blog. I'll make this a worldy color blog yet : )

Industrial Charm

A few weekends ago I walked the Brooklyn Bridge for the first time since living here and had so much fun exploring all the lines and architectural details. Above are just a sampling of what I discovered....

New Spring Palette

These are two little snapshots I took this past weekend as I shopped in Soho and Brooklyn. I loved the vibrant colors of the neon sign and the random flowers wrapped around the mint green barbed wire. This palette combines some funky colors together for a fresh Spring look...Enoy!

Instant Inspiration

My mom has a little Etsy shop where she sells vintage seam binding, collage sheets and even some of her artwork! The above images are 2 of her Instant Inspiration collage packs for only $4.00! I know she's my mom, but I love all of the vintage stuff she's selling and especially how she packages them. The new packs that she has created have such beautiful color combinations as well that I just want to buy them for the palette. So, check it out if you love vintage emphemera like myself or browse her website with all of her artwork at Lisa Cook Studio

On the road....

I know I've been away from this blog for a bit, but it's because I have been traveling for my job. I never mentioned this, but about a month a I got a new job as a color and trend forecaster for the fashion and interiors industry! My job will be consisting of combing the world for the next color palettes and fashion styling two years in advance. I'm very excited for it and so far it has been awesome! However, I have to seperate this blog from work, but I will still post my own color palettes and inspiration and hope to sneak in a few pics from the countries I will eventually travel to, etc....

The above image I took at Moma's Color Exhibit. A must see if you live in NYC!

Happy Easter!

My partner snapped this photo for me when she was in Austin, TX working on Food Network's Rescue Chef (she's the assistant culinary producer). At any rate I was impressed that she saw this color combo for me - the smoky, pastel eggplant color of the door with the pops of pink from the blossoms mixed with the washed out mustard-green of the house. It sort of is a new twist on the traditional Easter colors. So....Happy Easter everyone!