Reimagining colour
Some of the 70 shades from Coral that were used to create the 'Colors That Touch' series of Cromopoems. Image courtesy of AkzoNobel
Much has been done for the improvement of everyday life for blind people, from public to private spaces. In the metal packaging world, we’ve seen braille added to beverage cans by Ball Corporation and Minalba, to help differentiate between still and sparkling water options.
Now, in the space of colour, AkzoNobel has announced an interesting project alongside VML Brasil and the Dorina Nowill Foundation for the Blind, using sensation, poetry and sound to bring vivid hues to life for all those with visual impairments.
The project is based in Brazil* and entitled ‘Touching Color.’ Using braille and sound to translate RGB, CMYK and HEX colour codes into so-called Cromopoems, the project reimagines a set of 70 colours into a unique sensory experience. For example, Citrus Orange is described as: “That urge to bite into a fresh fruit in the playground. Letting the juice run down your chin and spending the day with its scent on your hands. That colour is Citrus Orange, a vibrant, warm shade of orange.”
The 70 colours were selected from nine chromatic scales in AkzoNobel’s portfolio. From these, initials were created in braille, adding graphic value and establishing a unique creative path for the project’s visual language.
The next step was to assemble the Cromopoems into a colour fan accessible to blind and low-vision people, which is based on three essential elements of colour, braille and the sensitivity of the visually impaired person. Printed on black cards, each colour in the fan is delivered through the emotions and sensations evoked by the braille text.
To ensure the Cromopoems are also accessible to those who don’t have access to the braille colour fan, audio versions of the descriptions (in Portuguese) have also been made available via a dedicated YouTube playlist.
Daniel Geiger Campos, global director of AkzoNobel’s Decorative Paints business and member of the executive committee, commented: “This project has taken a crucial step on the path to inclusion to ensure that more people can feel and choose colours in an innovative way, going beyond sight to explore new forms of sensory connection.”
There’s no doubt that colour adds meaning and value to everyone’s lives, so projects like Touching Color are imperative in ensuring accessibility stays at the forefront of innovation. It will be intriguing to see if Touching Color inspires can makers and brands to broaden the boundaries of colour for blind and visually impaired consumers in the near future.
*Brazil is a country that continues to lead the way, not only in this area but also in its recycling rates, recently reaching an impressive 97.3 per cent of cans recycled.
- Alex Rivers (she/her), CanTech International editor
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