Colours have a hue, such as red or blue. They also have a lightness: how light or dark they are. Pattern depends on lightness more than on hue.
Colour scientists treat the two separately. In the Munsell system, a colour is described by “value (lightness), chroma (saturation), and hue” (Wikipedia: Color theory). Lightness “operates independently of the hue and chroma” (Wikipedia: Lightness). A pale yellow and a pale blue are different hues. They can be the same in lightness.
Try it with a squint
Lay out some cloth. Half-close the eyes, or take a photo and turn it to black and white. Colours blur, and light and dark stay. If a pattern still shows, its light and dark are working.
Gradient
Gradient is one of the studio’s eleven patterns. Its own words are “Pale at the top corner, falling to the darkest cloth.”
In the code, each square is given a target lightness. The target runs from the lightest cloth in the box at the top left to the darkest at the bottom right. The studio then picks the cloth nearest each target.
Children can see this with any box. The colours can be all different. The panel still slides from pale to dark. That shows lightness is a separate thing from colour.
Chess
Chess says “Every seam earns its keep, light against dark.” The studio tries to put a light cloth beside a dark one at every seam, and also tries to make neighbours differ in colour.
Look at what happens when a light cloth meets a dark one. Each looks stronger. Neither loses its colour. The edge between them is easy to see.
Why both matter
A panel of cloths all the same lightness looks flat, even if the colours differ. A panel of cloths with a range of light and dark has shape. Gradient makes the shape a slope. Chess makes it a beat.
Try this in the studio:
- Open a box and press Gradient.
- Press Chess.
- Compare. Where does the eye go in each?
The studio starts with a Sample box of ten real cloths, so there is something to try at once.
Next steps
- Read colours change their neighbours for what light and dark do to a colour beside them.
- Start with a favourite colours panel.
- See all the patterns in 11 Kantha patterns for 35 squares of cloth.