Color is the
place where our brain and the universe meet. It creates, enhances, changes,
reveals and establishes the mood of the design. In my opinion this was one of
the most important lectures, because as future architects, we have to pay a lot
of attention to the way we use and design with color. We also got to practice
this in studio when we did the color designs, and we saw how beautiful and
difficult at the same time it is to work with colors and the ways we can pair
them and make 2 or more colors compatible with one-another.
All the
colors are created by the three primary colors: Red, Blue and Yellow. They then
are divided to warm and cool colors. This division is important and we
encounter it unconsciously on a daily bases: we see red always related to
warmth and blue to coolness. (weather reports, thermometers etc.).
Every color
has it’s unique features: value, chroma, tint, hue, tone and shade.
Another type
of color relationship that we got to practice on studio is monochromatic,
achromatic and complementary colors. We got the chance to choose which type of
relationship we can use on our design: monochromatic or complementary.
Monochromatic is using the different shades of the same color, and
complementary is using two colors that are on the opposite side of the
spectrum.
Another
importance of color is it’s psychology effects. It can have a huge effect on
our mood or the way we look at a building. We can see that in a lot of houses
when a room is smaller, if we want it to look bigger we design it with lighter
colors, and vice-versa, dark colors make a room look smaller. Our brain always
relates the color white to cleanness and freshness or we relate green to nature
and eco-friendly environment. It can also be used for cultural differences. Us Albanians,
always get a home-friendly feeling when we see the colors red and black
together, because it reminds us of our home country.
In architecture
color has been used since ancient times as a very important element. We use
color for division (In our university every class has it’s own unique color.).
When we see a kid’s room painted in blue, we know the child is a boy and when
it is pink it’s a girl. We can identify modern architecture by looking at it’s
typical colors: brick red, marble white and concrete gray.
Every space
can be distinguished with its approach towards the human and non-human
interaction. Architecture plays an important role in promoting it, and color in
architecture helps understand that interaction better.
