Warm Colours and Cool Colours

What's the difference between a warm colour and a cool colour? The simplest answer is that all the colours between red and yellow are warm, while those from green to purple are cool.

Looking at warm colours like red, orange, and yellow causes your blood pressure to rise slightly. Additional glucose heads to your brain. It's physically exciting, at least according to some researchers.

Looking a blue or green makes you calm. Your blood pressure lowers. If you were feeling a little angry or upset, those feelings will dissipate. Your blood pressure goes down a bit.

Restaurants are often decorated in warm colours like red, orange, or burgundy. The idea is that you'll feel more excited and hungrier -- but also that you'll finish your meal more quickly and leave so the staff can get a new party in at your table and earn more for the night.

A bright, sunny room can make people feel happier and more awake. Creative work may go better in such a stimulating environment. However, yellow can also make people feel a bit irritable, so you don't want that colour in your conference rooms.

That's fine as far as it goes, but we sometimes talk about warm or cool shade of white or grey. We talk about warmer and cooler variants of red or blue. How does that work?

Think of yellow as the ultimate warm colour and blue as the ultimate cool colour. Any shade of white that has yellow undertones is warm, while a white with more blue tones is cool.

The blues are both cool colours, certainly, and the reds are both warm. But see how the shades on the left contain more blue and the ones on the right contain more yellow. That makes the shades on the right warmer. So teal and russet are warmer than aqua and berry.

Some seasons, even the neutral colours tend to be warmer and some seasons, they're cooler. That difference can affect how calming or exciting a room is. It can also make your room look newer, more up to date, and more sophisticated. When a shade is just a bit different from what our eyes have gotten used to, it can feel more stimulating.