A vibrant area for connection.
Image courtesy of MillerKnoll
Let’s face it: Most workplaces feel dull. Offices, factories, retail stores, schools, hospitals, and other workplaces often seem institutional rather than vibrant and engaging. This is primarily because the use of color in these spaces is driven either by organizational brand standards or architectural color trends. However, one organization’s bold experimentation with color in schools is demonstrating a more impactful role for color in our environments — fostering a sense of connection and organizational pride. This new perspective on color usage has the potential to improve connection and reinvigorate the workplace.
The color of our spaces can have surprising effects on people’s lives. Color can influence a person’s emotions and mindset, their sense of safety, their connection to others, and even their sense of self-worth. The strategic use of color within the workplace can help facilitate certain activities: vibrant colors for socialization and sparking new ideas, muted colors for concentration, or calming colors for times of respite and contemplation. Despite this, the use of color in most workplaces is typically driven by aesthetic rather than experiential priorities.
Offices, in particular, are in need of a color makeover. A majority of office workers cite connection with others as their top priority for spending time in the office, and it has become common practice for CEOs to promote “culture” as the justification for return-to-office mandates. Yet, most spaces within the office where people are meant to connect — such as cafeterias, meeting rooms, coffee bars, and project spaces — don’t look noticeably different from the rest of the office. If strengthening connection and culture are the goals, then institutional brand standards should not govern the design.
Colorful place to connect.
Image courtesy of MillerKnoll
In California, one nonprofit organization is pioneering the use of color to improve culture and connection in different types of space: schools and community centers. Project Color Corps, founded by one of the world’s foremost color experts, Laura Guido-Clark, aims to enhance life at schools in underserved communities. Through a collaborative process, Guido-Clark’s team of volunteers works with students and educators to recolor drab and dated building exteriors to foster a greater sense of connection and wellbeing.
“Our surroundings directly impact how we feel,” says Guido-Clark. “Color has the power to change the way we see the world around us and the way we see ourselves. It can bring joy and ease, and elicit many emotions. Color acts as a point of connection between ourselves and our feelings, and can also connect us to one another and represent our larger shared stories.”
Playgrounds, in particular, are crucial spaces where young people live out a shared story. It’s in the context of play, apart from the order and supervision of the classroom, where social skills develop and friendships form. But too often, children in under-resourced schools experience this critical developmental time in gray, institutional environments. By collaborating with students and educators to transform a concrete playground into a vibrant hub of connection, Project Color Corps seeks to provide students a greater sense of pride and deeper attachment to their environment.
Before: exterior of Hoover Elementary before transformation
Image courtesy of Project Color Corps
In a recent project, Project Color Corps partnered with design firms BAMO and SWA, Steph and Ayeshia Curry’s Eat.Learn.Play foundation, and playground equipment nonprofit KABOOM! to transform the exterior of Hoover Elementary in Oakland, California. Through collaboration with students, parents, and educators, the team converted a full city block of beige buildings and concrete surfaces into a place that not only enhances connection and community pride for students but also for the surrounding neighborhood.
After: exterior of Hoover Elementary after transformation
Image courtesy of Project Color Corps
If playgrounds can undergo such transformational changes through the use of color, can offices, factories, and other workplaces also do so? Guido-Clark believes so.
“With Project Color Corps, it reinforced that color is one of the simplest and yet most powerful mediums that we have. We might think of it as surface, but it is so much deeper than that. Color is a conversation. It reflects who you are as an organization and how you want to feel within your offices, stores and spaces. This gives color intentionality. It helps you feel better, work better, and move through spaces better.”
To achieve this, organizations must initially acknowledge the role of their physical workspaces as crucial drivers of employee experience. Subsequently, as they prioritize specific areas for improvement, strategically employing color can serve as a catalyst to transform how employees interact with and within these spaces. As dull, conventional environments yield to more vibrant and purposeful designs, employees can gain a stronger sense of connection with each other, their employer, and the environments where they operate.
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Copyright for syndicated content belongs to the linked Source : Forbes – https://www.forbes.com/sites/ryananderson/2024/07/01/how-color-can-improve-connection-and-reinvigorate-the-workplace
