2015’s Trendy Colors

December 2nd, 2014

I’m from the wait-it-out-school of trend-setting, figuring that all trends run in cycles and that what was old eventually will become new again.

Calming colors are shaping up as the trend for 2015.

It’s why I’m sure that the 35-year-old leisure suit in my closet is going to become very hip again any day now.

Colors and styles in the garden aren’t quite as fickle as the fashion world, but they do change over time.

So if you want to keep up with the cutting edge on flower colors, you might be interested to hear that the Pantone Color Institute – the New Jersey-based authority on all things color – is forecasting soft, pastel, calming shades as the color trends of 2015.

In other words, next year’s hot colors won’t be hot at all. Just the opposite.

Pantone’s color-watchers say people are turning to relaxing cooler shades to counteract our increasingly hectic, always-plugged-in lifestyles.

Here’s what Pantone says will be 2015’s top-10 trendy colors: aquamarine, scuba blue, lucite green, classic blue, toasted almond, strawberry ice, tangerine, custard, marsala and glacier gray.

Pantone Executive Director Leatrice Eiseman says people these days tend to “feel compelled to be connected around the clock because we are afraid we’ll miss something important. There is a growing movement to step out and create ‘quiet zones’ to disconnect from technology and unwind, giving ourselves time to stop and be still.”

One way to do that is by planting get-away gardens – ones with loose rather than tightly trimmed plantings, ones that attract mesmerizing butterflies and hummingbirds, and ones that come in soft pastels rather than blaring reds and oranges.

Since trees, shrubs and perennials live for years or decades, the quickest way to adjust to changing colors is by annual flowers.

These are planted each spring and yanked after frost each fall, clearing the way to switch to a whole different set of species or colors the following year.

Flower breeders have made it easier than ever to shop by color by coming up with new and ever-widening ranges of hues throughout many species.

Geraniums, for example, range from hot reds to soft pink with scores of shades between, and petunias are now available in most every color, including white at one end of the spectrum to nearly black at the other.

Growers also have learned how to time and induce annuals so they’re already in bloom at buying time at the garden center. No guessing and no going only by the pictures.

If you want to be color-trendy in your 2015 garden, I’ve compiled a list of “in” annuals by shades on the Pantone hit list. Here you go:

Blue: ageratum, blue salvia, agapanthus, angelonia, evolvulus, scaevola, vinca, browallia (shade), and lobelia and pansies (spring and fall for best results).

Soft pink: alyssum, angelonia, begonia, celosia, cleome, geranium, globe amaranth, ivy geranium (part shade), million bells, New Guinea impatiens (part shade), nicotiana, pentas, petunia, verbena, vinca and zinnia.

Soft green: nicotiana and zinnia.

Peach/tangerine: million bells and verbena.

Creamy-white: marigold and petunia.

Gray: dusty miller and dichondra Silver Falls™.

If you’re looking to go longer-term with 2015’s shades, here are some perennial-flower options in soft colors:

Blue: baptisia, balloon flower, bluestar, campanula, catmint, hardy geranium, iris, salvia and veronica in sun; brunnera, leadwort and pulmonaria in part shade.

Soft pink: beebalm, coreopsis, creeping phlox, dianthus, gaura, hibiscus, Joe Pye weed, liatris, lily and tall garden phlox in sun; astilbe, bleeding heart, coralbells, foamflower, helleborus and lamium in part shade.

Creamy-white: candytuft, daylily, gaura, lily and mum in sun; astilbe, bleeding heart, coralbells, foamflower and turtlehead in part shade.

Pastel green: euphorbia (sun) and lady’s mantle (part shade).

Peach/tangerine: agastache and yarrow (both sun).

If you’re going even longer-term with 2015-trendy shades in shrubs, consider these:

Blue: butterfly bush, caryopteris, clematis and vitex in sun; hydrangea in part shade.

Soft pink: abelia, beautyberry, beautybush, crape myrtle, deutzia, lilac, rose, spirea and weigela in sun; hydrangea in part shade.

Creamy-white: deutzia, panicle hydrangea, rose and viburnum in sun; cherry laurel, fothergilla, oakleaf hydrangea and summersweet in part shade.

Peach/tangerine: rose, flowering quince and tree peony (sun to light shade).