Difficult as it is to describe, this frosty shade of pink with hues of salmon, apricot and light nude is all around — clothes, furniture, dip-dyed hair, even iPhone covers and movies. But what is it about this shade that has everyone — and specifically, people outside the clique-ish world of design — talking, writing and buying it?
Millennial Pink first showed up at the edge of the new millennium as Sarah Jessica Parker’s Carrie manoeuvred through New York in the title montage of the cult HBO series, Sex and the City. Carrie’s trend-signalling pale pink vest was lost in the babble about a $5 tutu. The shade re-emerged in 2012 on fashion runways and packaging — a light blush with a smattering of compact powder. Gone was the Barbie cheapness of the traditional pink. Instead, a neutral to the point of blase shade offered respite from a thousand options of Nude.
We live in a Millennial Pink world.
Like only a Wes Anderson movie can, in 2014, the layered pink poster for The Grand Budapest Hotel fuelled our obsession with the colour in way no other proponents of the shade yet had. The shade jumped from the fringes to the centre of the design world. The same year, designer India Mahdavi and artist David Shrigley festooned the iconic London restaurant Sketch with pink walls, pink velvet couches and matte gold accents. The scheme was so popular, Sketch abandoned its business model of redecorating every two years. Since then, from Dior to IKEA, every design brand has explored their version of it.
‘Le Refuge’ by Marc Ange.
At this year’s Salone del Mobile show, the curious shade of pink reigned as a singular trend. Marc Ange’s stunning outdoor retreat, Le Refuge was one of the most instragrammed design works to emerge from the annual Milanese event. I suspect it had to do with its largescale, millennial pink palm leaves. Also at the fair, Marni set up a pink sand exhibit that harped on our childhood playground memories and the Indian luxe design house Scarlet Splendour unveiled the pink and gold cabinet, Lotus Sanctum. “Millennial Pink brings a joyfulness and frivolity that’s the perfect antidote to the sombre world of today,” says Rue Kothari, Fair Director at Downtown Design. “It’s ironic, pop and in perfect contradiction to our natural landscape.”
At this point, I think it is imperative I demolish two myths surrounding ‘Millennial’ and ‘Pink’, if only to highlight the cause of the colour range’s sustained success.
Nothing girly about this pink.
First, contrary to what we have been trained to think, pink in itself is not a girly-girl colour. How could this colour be unidimensionally feminine when it is derived from passionate, fiery red, and is known to compliment blue undertones? Blame it on marketing genius. Millennial Pink, however, stands apart for its gender fluidity. It is as much for Drake (the Hotline Bling cover art) and Zayn (candy pink hair circa 2016) as it is for a certain Robyn Rihanna Fenty (the Giambattista Valli powder puff gown at the Valerian premier).
Second, it exists not because of the entitled generation it is named after. The shade in all practicality, succeeds Rose Quartz — one half of Pantone’s utterly loved dual Colour Of 2016. In removing the blue tones that formed the other half, Serenity, Millennial Pink is design code for the end of suffering. In its non-conformist stance, the colour speaks not only to Generation Y, but more so to their predecessors who headbutted issues of gender, class and age. “It is truly free of our preconceived notions,” says Amrish Patel, founder of the Dubai Design District based AR Gallery. “Millennial Pink is not one particular colour. There is a shade for everyone and every purpose. In that, I think the colour is inclusive and democratic.”
John Elliot runway, spring-summer 2017.
It would be a grave error to dismiss the colour range as a passing trend. Not only has this shade simmered to a full boil, but more importantly, Millennial Pink has captured the zeitgeist of the decade. Go ahead, paint your walls a muddy, greyish, peachy shade of blush!
