SEW: Let's Begin - Create the Perfect Color Palette

​In this lesson of the SEW: Let’s Begin Series, we are going to be going back to the basics of color and using the good ol’ color wheel to create the perfect color palette.  Being aware of how colors are mixed, blended and combined can help a great deal when trying to create the perfect color palette for your project. 
 
The Color Wheel
This rainbow of color is actually rooted in three colors: red, yellow and blue or primary colors.  These three colors can be mixed in combination with each other to create other colors, basically all other colors are derived from these three primary colors.

​Secondary Colors are formed by the mixing two of the primary colors.  Secondary colors include: orange green and purple.

​Tertiary Colors are created by mixing a primary and a secondary color.  That is why the color usually has a two-word name like blue-green, red-violet, or yellow-orange.
 

 Now that we know the color wheel basics, let’s move into Color Harmony.  I know what you are thinking, ‘Dawn, this can’t be a real thing.  It sounds like the name of a My Little Pony.’  But trust me, it’s real and it is what’s going to really make your projects stand out from a crowd and have you look at colors in a whole new way!
 
Color Harmony, in its basic form, is whatever is pleasing to the eye.  This can be touted as personal preference but I promise, there is a science behind it.  You how sometimes you look at fabric swatches for hours and are just not happy with your selections??
 
9 times out of 10 the colors or pattern choices are not in harmony and are fighting with each other in our brains for attention.  The human brain rejects what it cannot organize or what it cannot understand. It also needs to be stimulated but not over stimulated with extreme complex patterns/colors.  So that is where harmony comes in, a little space in between outright crazy and just plain boring.
 
Still confused?? Just buy fabric that makes you happy and doesn't leave you with a face of regret.