• 11th edition of Clariant's color forecasting guide for the plastics industry
• Trend analysis and color-design tool offers creative inspiration

Clariant, a world leader in specialty chemicals, has released ColorForward® 2017, the 11th annual color forecasting guide for the plastics industry. The 2017 guide visualizes trends like data mining, growing social disconnection and the search for more meaningful lives.

“ColorForward 2017 is very different from the 2016 edition we released a year ago,” explains Judith van Vliet, ColorWorks Designer at ColorWorks Europe, Merate, Italy. “We believe the mood is becoming a bit more fearful, more introspective and reflecting the disconnectedness that many people seem to be feeling today. There are some exceptions of course, but in general the colors are more muted, softer, darker and even ambiguous.”

“Different people will respond to ColorForward in different ways,” she says. Each of the trend themes is represented by a palette of five colors. These are not intended to predict the “next hot color,” however. Instead, they are presented to Clariant customers as a creative experience. For some, the trend themes and color palettes offer inspiration while, for others, they serve as confirmation of what they already think and see.

The trend name: ANNOY FIRM OMIT
is an anagram of the phrase “my information” and it is intended to capture the ambiguous, yin/yang nature of the information universe. Data mining, or the systematic sifting of digital information to achieve a specific purpose, is central to this trend theme. The duality of the web-world is captured in the annoy firm omit trend colors. Two of the five are dark and sinister.

The trend: DELONELINATION
In a connected world, the last taboo is being lonely. “Delonelination is a wake-up call,” says Judith van Vliet. “It is a warning that loneliness is on the rise, particularly among young people. The five colors representing this trend are generally pale and muted, ranging from a beige to suggest the human need to be handled with care, to a plain brown. 

The theme NEBULOVE could almost be seen as the antithesis of loneliness because it recognizes a trend toward complex connected relationships between multiple people who may be married or not depending on what gives them fulfillment. Colors representing this theme are a light green/yellow like the inside of a cucumber, and a diffuse red. There is a lilac purple and a brownish orange, almost cognac-colored shade. A deep soft pink color called Perky Star is used to represent the “happy single.”

The trend: IT’S A TRAP!
“Life can be a trap,” says van Vliet. “It can be hard and stressful – or just plain dull – if you allow it to become that way, and so people are beginning to seek new ways to break out, to be curious and explore the limits of the human mind. This trend is about escapism and finding new modes of perception.” Not surprisingly, the colors of this trend theme tend toward a funky new aesthetic.