We all perceive colors slightly differently—what one person might think is red, for example, appears orange to someone else. Color association, however, is widely shared within a society: A red road sign conveys a warning, regardless of how you see the color red. 

In fashion, this instinctive response to color has become an integral part of a brand’s aesthetic considerations. Each season, new collections are presented at runway shows that appear to articulate a designer’s singular creative vision. Behind the scenes in the fashion world, however, color is a science rather than an art. It’s a phenomenon that Andy, the fledgling personal assistant played by Anne Hathaway in The Devil Wears Prada, discovers the hard way. Her apparently innocuous blue sweater actually represents—in the withering words of Meryl Streep’s terrifying fashion editor—millions of dollars and the work of countless designers. Nowhere is this more notable than with sneakers. Sportswear companies invest heavily into developing striking colorways that evoke a particular emotion or spark an association with a style or period: the bright contrasting colors of the 1990s, say, or yellows and oranges that create a sense of energy. As The New York Times reported in 2021, so important is color to sportswear brands that some even have dedicated color experts to find the exact hue that will come to define a collection or even, in some cases, the era. 

Even if, like Andy, you choose not to engage with fashion, it is the decisions of designers and color forecasters that come to inform what we buy and how we dress. It’s not blue, it’s cerulean!