If you want to fall back in love with colour, read The Secret Lives of Colour

A dazzling and vibrant history of colour, from Van Gogh’s wilting yellow sunflowers to Turner’s deadly green and Picasso’s darkest period

This is a gorgeous book

Even Farrow and Ball don’t know as much about the secret lore of colour as Kassia St Clair... Almost every page throws up an unexpected detail and insight... Extraordinarily full and interesting…An ideal crib and a valuable resource not only for the design-conscious but for students.

The weirdly fascinating history of your favourite hues from an unwittingly deadly, arsenic-tinged green to Van Gogh’s favoured yellow

‘An excellent, innovative and idiosyncratic cultural history that will colour your thinking…St Clair writes with style, energy and knowledge, explaining many mysteries succinctly and wittily, such as why a regular tomato is, for example, not red. Tomatoes appear red because that’s the very wavelength their skin does not absorb. A ‘red’ tomato lies to tell the truth.. Snappily designed, with high production values…[The Secret Lives of Colour is] attractive and diverting.’

Beautiful…See how a single colour can tell different stories across the globe.

A work of art in its own right… a beautiful tactile book filled with fascinating anecdotes about every colour from blonde to puce.

Charming

From pink boys’ clothes to blue warpaint; why orange spells danger and other colourful tales

Inspiring, compelling and beautifully designed . . . this book will appeal to anyone

A mind-expanding tour of the world without leaving your paintbox. Every colour has a story, and here are some of the most alluring, alarming, and thought-provoking. Very hard painting the hallway magnolia after this inspiring primer

A companionable, informative and lively guide to sights so easily taken for granted

A vivid exploration of the world of colour and our colourful world . . . St Clair is able to dance effortlessly through an astonishing range of subjects . . . What The Secret Lives of Colour offers really is, in some sense, a flash portrait of human civilisation, a zigzagging and unpredictable exploration of how significantly colour has shaped histories and disciplines, fuelled empires, changed the nature of war and caused species to flourish or face extinction

An irresistible lexicon of colours

Well-researched and engaging

Brimming with interesting facts, historical insights and curious tales.

Kassia St Clair is well-placed to observe the important place that colour has in human civilisation and development…Discursive and anecdotal… this book holds many surprises. Nothing is quite what it seems or how it is seen.

A mix of science lore and delightful bookmaking, The Secret Lives of Colour is for reading, dipping and holding up against your curtains

Extremely well-researched historically, each colour story is rich in detail and description, combining vignettes of historical actors with contextual background ranging from the ancient past to the present day. For anyone who was ever fascinated by a box of crayons, coloured pencils or the story of people in time, St Clair’s book will not disappoint

I recommend the book to all creatives – and non-creatives, too!

Beautifully presented . . . The book is simply about colour. But colour is not simple. The history, geography, politics, scandals and influence of colours are documented here with a knowledgeable voice. With references from Jessica Rabbit to Lord Mountbatten, from Greek poets to slavery, this is a fascinating read