Color Psychology in Interior Design: Choosing Shades for Each Room

Color psychology plays a key role in interior design, shaping the mood and experience of any space. Choosing the right fabric color can influence how people feel and interact with a room. In the hospitality industry, for instance, warm tones can make a lobby feel welcoming and energetic, while cool hues create a calming environment.

Selecting performance fabrics in the right colors that can withstand frequent use yields multiple advantages. It can help you meet your aesthetic business goals by:

• Accurately representing your brand and painting it in a positive light.
• Investing in quality fabric that aligns with the space’s intended function.

Understanding How Color Impacts Mood

Color psychology extends beyond direct marketing, landing in the middle of ambience creation. While accenting with your corporate colors is necessary to reinforce branding, you should also choose complementary colors in designs that create the right mood. Neutral tones like gray and white are versatile in room designs. They create a clean, sophisticated look and can act as a backdrop when used in flooring or wallpaper, as well as bolder design elements. These colors evoke specific moods:

• Red: This color radiates passion and excitement. Consider red and adjacent colors for creative spaces like meeting rooms or outdoor areas.
• Blue: Blue emits calmness and tranquility, which feeds into bedrooms and office spaces.
• Green: Representing growth, renewal and balance, green is a good upholstery color for offices.
• Yellow: Reflecting feelings of joy, confidence and optimism, yellow works well in hallways and dining rooms.
• Orange: Orange is known to spark enthusiasm, sociability and creativity. It may also stimulate appetite, making this color a good choice for dining areas.
• Purple: Reflecting originality, creative flair and luxury, purple is a good accent color for meeting rooms or art studios.
• Gray: This color represents practicality, sophistication and subtlety. When you pair it with the right colors, gray can evoke positive feelings in many people.
• Brown: Representing stability, earthiness and comfort, brown is a great base color as it complements many other accent colors.
• White: White is the epitome of purity, cleanliness and freshness, making this color ideal for linens and towels.
• Black: Black reflects sophistication, boldness and mystery. This functional color is often used in professional settings for its elegance.

How Color Impacts Design

The color of your performance fabrics significantly shapes the mood and functionality of interior spaces. In settings like bedrooms, workspaces, outdoor spaces and communal areas, color choice directly affects how people interact with the environment. Light also impacts color perception. Natural and artificial lighting can change a color’s appearance. Bright light makes color pop and feel more vibrant, while dim lighting softens colors.

Communal Areas

When it comes to living rooms or lobbies, performance fabrics in neutral or muted tones create a calm, inviting atmosphere. These hues make the space feel open while offering the flexibility to use the accent colors you want. Bright colors can add energy and encourage social interaction. Earthy tones like greens or warm browns evoke a sense of comfort through a connection to nature.

Bedrooms

Color selection in bedrooms impacts sleep quality and relaxation. Soft tones like light grays or pale blues promote tranquility and are ideal for upholstered headboards or bedding accents. Darker shades like charcoal or navy can add warmth and intimacy to the room.

Workspaces

Workspace colors directly influence focus and productivity. Bright, stimulating colors like yellow boost creativity, while softer shades of blue or green promote concentration. Opt for performance fabrics that offer a blend of comfort and function in ergonomic seating, curtains or cushions. Use cool, neutral tones to create a professional, uncluttered look and avoid distractions.

Outdoor Spaces

Color serves both practical and aesthetic purposes for outdoor furniture. Light-color fabrics reflect heat to keep seating areas cool, while bold colors like vibrant blues or reds make a dramatic statement, tying the outdoor design to nature. Earth tones will blend into the surroundings to create that seamless transition between the indoors and outdoors.

What Impacts Color Perception?

Fabric selection also affects color perception. Texture plays a key role in how we see color. A fabric’s surface either absorbs or reflects light, which changes the way colors appear to the eye. Smooth textiles, especially synthetics, reflect more light, making colors appear brighter and more vibrant. Rough textures, such as natural fibers or cotton, scatter light, making colors look more muted or soft. 

A color’s characteristics can also change the mood it creates — this refers to the hue and these characteristics:

• Tone: When a color is mixed with gray, its darkness or lightness changes without altering the hue. It can soften color intensity, impacting how vibrant or dull the color feels.
• Shade: Adding black to a color changes its shade, making it darker and adding depth.
• Value: Value refers to a color’s darkness or lightness, playing a crucial role in creating contrast and visual interest.
• Tint: Adding white to a color makes it lighter and adjusts the tint to influence its brightness.
• Saturation: Saturation refers to a color’s intensity or purity. Highly saturated colors are rich and vivid, while low-saturation colors are more muted.

How to Adapt to Seasonal Color Trends in Interior Design

Choosing an adaptable palette is crucial in interior design. White, black and beige are timeless neutral colors that work in most spaces. Corporate spaces can rely on these colors as their base and introduce seasonal colors to use as accents. A hotel lobby with neutral walls, for example, can potentially cut back on renovation costs by swapping upholstery and using trending or seasonal colors to adapt to aesthetics that resonate with guests.

Currently, neutral and muted tones are dominating design trends. Businesses like hotels and offices are using biophilic hues with forest greens and warm browns that contribute to a calming atmosphere. Pairing these with bold accents like terracotta red or sky blue in seating or curtains keeps the space dynamic and adds to its character. These colors are also adaptable enough to work in various areas, from lounges to meeting rooms.

Find Design Inspiration With Swavelle Group

Color psychology plays a crucial role in interior design by influencing the behavior and mood of those occupying the space. Combining the principles of color theory with the functional benefits of performance fabrics, you will enhance the durability and design of furnishings. 

When working with SG, you will find superior performance fabrics in our Bella Dura™ and Bella Dura™ Home brands. These fabrics are fade resistant, easy to clean, made in the United States and suitable for both indoor and outdoor use. SG offers various in-house fabric designs and can manufacture custom fabrics for your projects.

Contact our team today to find the right performance fabric for your business needs.