Crowds gathered at the iconic New York Public Library on 42nd Street, getting an exclusive preview of the library’s yet-unopened Gottesman Hall. The event’s main attraction wasn’t the hall itself — which has been undergoing renovation led by Dutch firm Mecanoo — but, rather, the unveiling of Benjamin Moore’s Color of the Year for 2017.
Finally, as party revelers were distracted by video presentation on multiple screens leading up to the big reveal, Benjamin Moore vice president of color innovation and design Carl Minchew appeared at the center of the hall and standing on a platform painted in the new Color of the Year: Shadow (2117-30).
“We have 3,500 colors and every one of them tells a story. But, during the last few years, we have taken it upon ourselves to select one of those colors as the color of the year, the ‘spokes color’ of that year,” said Minchew. “We picked the one that we thought was very relevant, very energetic and really a part of the design around us. It’s a rich, royal, deep amethyst,” he continued before commenting about its contrast from 2016’s Simply White.
“A little darker, a little more emotion. More than a color, it’s a story about light as well as shadow,” he said. “We observe what happens when a light travels through a house, illuminating the rooms and then, as the sun goes down, the light inside the house gets darker. We were very inspired to tell this story.”
In a statement, Benjamin Moore’s creative director Ellen O’Neill added, “Allusive and enigmatic, Shadow is a master of ambiance. It is a color that calls to mind a ‘past,’ yet it can also make a contemporary, color-confident statement.”
As in previous years, the paints and coatings company unveiled not only the Color of the Year, but also its official trends palette for 2017, which is a corresponding palette of 23 rich and sophisticated hues. Ranging from muted to saturated tones, they include: Amulet, Salamander, Guacamole, Sandlot Gray, Sea Star, Etruscan, Chalk White, Porcelain, Sea Life, Stormy Monday, Grandfather Clock Brown, Wet Concrete, Cloud Cover, Dinner Party, Wish, Night Shade, Knoxville Gray, Ebony King, Gentleman’s Gray, Pink Bliss, Iceberg and Dark Burgundy.
