Expect the color magenta to seep into every part of your world – in outdoor plants, event design, decor, and of course floral arrangements at home.
Not only has Pantone named PANTONE 18-1750 Viva Magenta as its 2023 Color of the Year, but the folks at 1-800-Flowers have also declared that the orchid in the same color tone is the Flower of 2023.
What a coincidence that their teams have canvased the culture to arrive at this color palette. Well, it is an upbeat color.
Jeff Leatham’s “Kaleidoscope” display at the 2022 NYBG Orchid Show. Photo courtesy of the NYBG.
When these two news stories arrived I couldn’t help but immediately think of Jeff Leatham. Frequently the maestro behind the floral displays at the Four Seasons Hotel in Los Angeles, Philadelphia and Paris, Leatham oversaw the 2022 New York Botanical Orchid Show. One can say he is the king of orchids, and has created an empire with his artistic use of – you guessed it – magenta orchids.
“It’s my favorite color orchid,” he shared with me at the New York Botanical Show.
Design and photo by Kit Kemp.
The bold hue will now likely be seen everywhere, as when two trend-setting powerhouses like Pantone and 1-800-Flowers make these announcements, the culture responds and there is a ripple effect.
“We expect that there will be an uptick in demand for magenta orchids,” says Toine Overgaag, president of Westerlay Orchids, one of the United States’ largest orchid growers. “They already are very popular.”
Furthermore, as we reported, ever since the designer Halston popularized orchids as home decor must-haves, the long-lasting blooms have also gone down in price making it easier for consumers to buy and enjoy. Interior decorator Jeffrey Bilhuber added that Halston made orchids “seem not a rarity but a necessity. They looked just amazing – sensuous without being romantic, and floral without being flowery.”
Designs from the Pantone x Spoonflower collaboration. Photo courtesy of Spoonflower.
As Bartholomew Motes, a Florida-based breeder of rare orchids explains, the latest appeal of orchids has been growing as a result of “the adoption of orchids and other rare plants by a young, increasingly diverse group of plantreneuers.”
“Their fingernails may have as much dirt as past generations but they are tapping those fingers against smartphones and creating followings on Instagram and TikTok,” he says.
Meanwhile, Pantone now has partnered with Spoonflower. The wallpaper company has unveiled one-of-a-kind designs by six distinguished Spoonflower Independent Artists featuring a custom color palette as well as fabric. Magenta also complements so many other colors – ranging from beige and browns to purples and yellows.
Design by Madcap Cottage. Photo by Max Kim-Bee.
Adds Madcap Cottage co-founder Jason Oliver Nixon, “Dark pink is a new classic and is a hue that is both uplifting and super flattering. “You can also mix it with kinky orange and watch the sparks fly.”
Designer Kit Kemp has also often used magenta in her acclaimed work long before it was cool. While everyone else wanted a sea of neutrals, Kemp recognized that these saturated pinks were as she told me, “happy colors.”
Over in Illinois, Ball Horticultural – the powerhouse growing company – was thrilled with this color selection from Pantone. Not a surprise. The Chicago-based flower breeders already have so many flowering plants and seed collections in this color wave. This means that consumers can buy and grow these varieties for 2023. After all, last year’s Pantone was Veri Peri and the blue family is not represented as abundantly as pretty dark pinks.
A version of this story originally appeared on FlowerPowerDaily.com.
Jill Brooke is a former CNN correspondent, Post columnist and editor-in-chief of Avenue and Travel Savvy magazine. She is an author and the editorial director of FPD, and a contributing digital editor of aspire design and home magazine.
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