Why I’m rebelling against Pantone’s Color of The Year

Pantone describes its 2026 Color of the Year, Cloud Dancer, as “a lofty white that serves as a symbol of calming influence in a society rediscovering the value of quiet reflection…Cloud Dancer encourages true relaxation.”

“Quiet reflection” for a white that is simultaneously dingy and sterile takes me back to my days in daycare. I was in before- and after-school daycare from grades 2-4. My daycare’s walls were white but, in a building full of children, that white was far from pristine. The overhead lights were fluorescent tubes, and they would get flicked off and on in rapid succession, when it was time to line up or be quiet.

Little Jessica, 2nd grade.

The after-school classrooms were pure chaos. We were both overstimulated and tired from our school day, bussed from our school buildings to daycare, the temporary corral until we could finally go home. Mrs. Jan was the headmistress in charge and she ruled the classrooms with an iron fist. At any given time, all four corners of a room might have a kid in timeout, with kids seated at tables waiting for their turn. A timer would go off, a corner would be freed up, and a kid waiting at one of the tables would take their turn occupying the corner. Mostly these kids were in timeout for being rowdy. Despite apparently being Mrs. Jan’s favorite, that didn’t save me from my own contemplative time spent in a corner — a corner so similar in color to Cloud Dancer.

My crime was almost always talking back. I was precocious in other ways, but when I felt something needed to be said, it was my solemn duty as a 9-year-old to speak my truth. Or rather, interject. For some reason, adults in charge never took kindly to that. My boldness would land me in timeout, in that shadowed white vertex with a kitchen timer.

My time served becoming intimately acquainted with the white walls of daycare didn’t set me back on the righteous path. If anything, it taught me that adults didn’t like what I had to say and I needed to be quiet. It has taken me a lifetime to unlearn that conditioning and stop playing small.

Cloud Dancer, in its inhospitable blankness is not a color of this moment. Rather, it is a color of striving to recede, literally, into the wall. Pantone’s own description of “calming influence in a society rediscovering the value of quiet reflection” reads like code for timeout. This color and shift in attitude is not the answer.

I would suggest a return to the earth instead — greens, browns, blues — for inspiration and full expression of our voices. Even the dark midnight blue of a clear night sky is more comforting and inspiring than a dingy white that begs us to be quiet and blend in. My response is to resist the message that Cloud Dancer carries. I choose to live boldly with colors that inspire me. I invite you to choose your own color for this year.

https://www.pantone.com/color-of-the-year/2026#:~:text=The%20Pantone%20Color%20of%20the%20Year%20for,lightness%20*%20Evoke%20gentle%20pleasure%20without%20overstimulation