Fashion History Mystery 15: Pantone (Dressed Classic)

Summary

Podcast Summary:

Dressed: The History of Fashion
Episode: Fashion History Mystery 15: Pantone (Dressed Classic)
Hosts: Cassie Zachary, April Callahan
Date: January 9, 2026

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Episode Overview

In this special Fashion History Mystery minisode, hosts Cassie Zachary and April Callahan answer listener questions about one of the most influential names in color: Pantone. They dive into Pantone’s origins, its impact on the design and fashion world, the evolution of color standardization, and the cultural phenomenon of the Pantone Color of the Year. The episode blends historical context, industry anecdotes, and lively banter about how Pantone became an icon of taste, branding, and merchandising.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Pantone’s Origins and Purpose

[01:22–02:55]

• Listener Questions: Sparked by colorful inquiries from Catherine Shipke and Jenna Quick.
• Pantone’s Mission: Founded in 1963 to address problems in color communication, especially among printers and designers.
  • Before Pantone, specifying a color (like “bright green”) could result in vastly different shades from different vendors.
  • Pantone’s Matching System created a standardized reference for color.
• Quote (April Callahan, 01:58):
  "This allowed for a greater consistency of color in products produced not only from one printing vendor to another, but also entirely around the globe. Which is of course incredibly important when it comes to branding."

2. The Power of Standardization

[03:00–03:26]

• Despite the widespread success of Pantone’s color standardization, the hosts humorously lament the lack of similar standardization in clothing sizes.
  • Cassie: “Can we please standardize sizing in clothing manufacturing? We've done it for coloring.” (03:02)
• April notes individualized body types and the potential of 3D body scanning for the future of sizing.

3. Historic Precedents for Color Swatches

[04:02–05:23]

• Pantone was not the first to create color guides—19th-century French dye and textile manufacturers pioneered color swatch books for designers.

• These swatch cards became essential for color forecasting in fashion.

• Quote (Business and Design Historian Reggie Blascheck, via Guest Host, 04:41):
  "Some type of system was needed to keep track of what colors had been popular in recent shopping seasons and more important, to anticipate what variation of those colors were likely to win consumer hearts in the upcoming shopping season."

4. Pantone’s Evolution and Influence

[03:26–05:23]

• Within a decade of its founding, Pantone had sold over 100,000 chip books; by 2015, sales reached into the millions.
• The chip books are costly but now industry-standard.
• Pantone now offers extensive color, trend, and forecasting resources.

5. Pantone Color of the Year and Modern Cultural Impact

[06:00–07:03]

• The Pantone Color of the Year, launched in 1999, involves trend analysis by the Pantone Color Institute, which examines global influences from art to socioeconomic trends.
• Example: 2019’s Color of the Year – Living Coral, described as “emitting the desired familiar and energizing aspects of color found in nature ... vivifying and effervescent... mesmerizes the eye and mind.”

6. Expanding Services and Signature Collaborations

[07:03–09:05]

• The Pantone Color Institute also educates about color psychology and helps brands develop custom colors (e.g., Tiffany’s signature “1837 Blue”).

• Fun Fact (April, 07:19):
  "The luxury purveyor Tiffany worked with their custom color experts back in 2001 to standardize their signature robin egg blue across any medium it was needed for..."

• Pantone even crafted "Minion Yellow" for Universal's Despicable Me, the first time a Pantone shade was named after a character.

7. Pantone as Lifestyle & Brand

[08:22–09:25]

• Pantone’s brand extends beyond design, with merch like mugs and notebooks styled after their iconic color chips.

• Partnerships include a lipstick line with Sephora and a Pantone Hotel in Brussels (“stay in color!”).

• Hotel features seven color palettes in a minimalist-modern setting; rooms start at €59 per night.

• Quote (April, 09:25):
  "This company is basically like the go to for color applications across the design industries. And they're still going strong after more than 50 years in the biz."

8. Pantone by the Numbers

[09:25–10:23]

• Pantone’s offerings have grown from the original 500 colors to over 2,500 officially recognized Pantone colors.

9. Personal Touches & Humorous Asides

[10:23–10:29]

• April jokes about wanting Pantone Universe lipstick, and Cassie teases her about her lipstick collection.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• "The name Pantone will certainly be familiar to any of you who work in printing or design professions. But for those of you who do not, today we investigate what is arguably the shadiest company in the world."
  — Guest Host, [01:22]

• On early color standardization:
  "The woman who wanted a cerise ribbon to embellish her new cerise ... was likely to be exasperated by a dry goods shop that only carried rose or purple....She walked out and marched over to competing store where the merchandise had been better selected and was in sync with the latest vogue."
  — Reggie Blascheck, quoted by Guest Host, [04:41]

• About Pantone’s star status:
  "In light of their products ubiquitous use ... the company in and of itself has actually developed this kind of we're trendy with the cool kids reputation."
  — April Callahan, [08:22]

• On Pantone’s ever-growing palette:
  "Their original 500 color offerings are now 2,500—more than 2,500 official Pantone colors."
  — April Callahan, [09:25]

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• Pantone’s History and Original Purpose: [01:22–02:55]
• Color Standardization, Sizing in Fashion: [03:00–03:26]
• Historical Color Swatch Books: [04:02–05:23]
• Pantone’s Growth, Modern Role: [03:26–05:23], [06:00–09:25]
• Pantone Color of the Year Explained: [06:00–07:03]
• Brand Collaborations and Merchandising: [08:22–09:25]
• By-the-numbers Pantone Growth: [09:25–10:23]

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Tone & Style

The hosts balance scholarly insight with an accessible, playful tone. Their banter invites listeners into the world of color with warmth, wit, and a knack for storytelling. Technical details are interspersed with personal anecdotes and cultural references, making for a lively, educational mini-episode.

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Conclusion

This episode offers a concise yet comprehensive look at Pantone, revealing how a company founded to solve technical problems became a touchstone for creativity and culture. It blends history and pop culture, covering everything from 19th-century textile cards to the latest color trends, and shows how Pantone created a universal language for color that shapes everything from fashion to branding to lifestyle.

Transcript

[Everett Rummage]

The French Revolution set Europe ablaze. It was an age of enlightenment and progress, but also of tyranny and oppression. It was an age of glory and an age of tragedy. One man stood above it all. This was the age of Napoleon. I'm Everett Rummage, host of the Age of Napoleon podcast. Join me as I examine the life and times of one of the most fascinating and enigmatic characters in modern history. Look for the age of Napoleon. Wherever you find your podcasts, please enjoy.

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One of our favorite episodes from the Dressed archive of over 500 plus shows.

[Cassie Zachary]

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[April Callahan]

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[Cassie Zachary]

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[Guest or Additional Host]

Welcome to Dressed the History of Fashion, a podcast that explores the who, what, when? Of why we wear.

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We are friends, fashion historians and your.

[Cassie Zachary]

Hosts, Cassie Zachary and April Callahan.

[April Callahan]

Welcome everyone to our Thursday Fashion History Mystery Edition where we answer you our listeners questions and we've recently received two very colorful inquiries from listeners Catherine Shipke and Jenna Quick for a minisode on Pantone, to which Cass and I both responded. Oh yes.

[Guest or Additional Host]

Oh yeah. Because the name Pantone will certainly be familiar to any of you who who work in printing or design professions. But for those of you who do not, today we investigate what is arguably the shadiest company in the world. Pantone, now perhaps the most widely recognized firm working in the spectrum of color intelligence. Pantone was founded in 1963 with the intention of creating a global standard for communication about color. So prior to this, professional printers in particular struggled with the ways in which specific colors used hues and shades were referenced within the design industries.

[April Callahan]

And to rectify this kind of dearth of technical nomenclature, in 1963 Pantone issued its Pantone Matching System, a collection of 500 colors with names that codified the exact mixture of the CMYK inks used to create the color. And this allowed for a greater consistency of color in products produced not only from one printing vendor to another, but but also entirely around the globe. Which is of course incredibly important when it comes to branding. You know, say for instance, that you're using two different printing vendors to print your packaging and you're using someone on the east coast and you're using someone on the west coast in order to supply your regional customers, you know, CAs, without needlessly shipping all your packaging supplies all the way across the country. So, so when you went to these two different vendors and you specified that you wanted bright green for your logo without a standard way to convey the exact shade of bright green. You might just end up with two different bright greens used for your logo.

[Sponsor/Announcer]

Which was a problem.

[Guest or Additional Host]

And I just want to sidebar real quick and say, can we please standardize sizing and clothing manufacturing? We've done it for coloring. Have not quite managed to get there with clothing. But anyways, I digress.

[April Callahan]

I think, I think the issue for that is more everyone has different body types and I think 3D body scanning is going to be the answer to that. And that's just like coming now to the market.

[Guest or Additional Host]

That's right. That's very true. So episode to come. So although Pantone was not the first company to endeavor to solve the problem of standardization, it quickly became the industry leader. Within a decade, Pantone had sold more than 100,000 of its signature color chip books, which allowed for quick visual perusal and selection from Pantone's signature palettes. A 2015 profile on Pantone in the business journal Fast Company cites Pantone's own estimation of the number of chip books sold now to be in the millions, which is especially interesting because they are quite pricey.

[April Callahan]

Yes, they are. And an other interesting side note, Cass, is that long before Pantone, there's actually a historic precedent of designers relying on color swatch books. So during the 19th century, French dye and textile manufacturers, who, of course being French, were setting the pace of fashion, as we know. But these manufacturers were regularly producing swatch books which kind of functioned as advertisements of their wares for the upcoming season and they distributed to their customers. And eventually, over the course of time, the designers that were receiving these color swatch cards came to rely on them as a form of color forecasting.

[Guest or Additional Host]

In the words of business and design historian Reggie Blascheck, some type of system was needed to keep track of what colors had been popular in recent shopping seasons and more important, to anticipate what variation of those colors were likely to win consumer hearts in the upcoming shopping season. The woman who wanted a cerise ribbon to embellish her new cerise, which we should say is a bright or deep red color easter bonnet and match her new cerise gloves, was likely to be exasperated by a dry goods shop that only carried rose or purple the shelter. She walked out and marched over to competing store where the merchandise had been better selected and was in sync with the latest vogue.

[April Callahan]

Official trade organizations of the French dyeing and textile industries now took over the task of monitoring sales trends as well as the oversight and production of color shade cards for their respective disciplines. And this legacy of color forecasting remains at the core of companies today like Pantone, which offers a variety of color, trend and forecast publications tailored to specific industry uses in print and digital graphics, product packaging, fashions, interiors basically cast just about anything else that calls for a designer to research and then decide upon the color of their upcoming product lines.

[Guest or Additional Host]

This aspect of Pantone's range of services is perhaps best publicized annually when it names the Pantone Color of the year. Instituted in 1999, this year actually marks the 20th anniversary of the Color of the Year selection process. So when the company says quote requires thoughtful consideration and trend analysis to arrive at the selection each year, Pantone's color experts at the Pantone Color Institute comb the world looking for new color influences. And this can include the entertainment industry, films and production, traveling, art collections and new artists. All areas of design, popular travel destination as well as new lifestyles and socioeconomic conditions. And the 2019 Pantone color of the Year do to do is living coral, which the company describes as emitting the quote desired familiar and energizing aspects of color found in nature. In its glorious yet unfortunately more elusive display beneath the sea, this vivifying and effervescent color mesmerizes the eye and mind.

[April Callahan]

I'm glad Cas that you brought up the Pantone Color Institute. Because they are a division of Pantone where some really cool things are happening, interested parties can work with them to receive education on the psychology and emotional impact of color.

[Sponsor/Announcer]

Wow.

[April Callahan]

Or they can also work with Pantone's experts to develop custom colors to support their brand identity. I mean, colors that kind of haven't existed before in the world. And the luxury purveyor Tiffany worked with their custom color experts back in 2001 to standardize their signatures Robin egg blue across any medium it was needed for because sometimes they were getting different results when they were printing on paper versus digital. So they can Pantone can really get in there and problem solve for you in this way. And when Tiffany worked with them, Pantone actually gave their signature color its own name. It's called 1837 Blue. And 1837 is actually a reference to 1837, which was the year that Tiffany was founded.

[Guest or Additional Host]

I love that.

[Cassie Zachary]

I know.

[Guest or Additional Host]

And I read an adorable article recently about how Pantone worked with the film series Despicable Me to create their color Minion Yellow, which is the first time a Pantone color has ever been named after a character.

[April Callahan]

And if that doesn't put a smile on your face, I don't know what will because they're adorable. And another interesting Fact is that in light of their products ubiquitous use in all different realms of design, the company in and of itself has actually developed this kind of we're trendy with the cool kids reputation.

[Guest or Additional Host]

Yeah.

[April Callahan]

And Pantone has started to capitalize, capitalize on their kind of popularity with their own merchandise. And they have this Pantone lifestyle line that offers coffee mugs, notebooks, holiday ornaments. And so many of these are playfully riffing on the, the minimalist chic of their actual color chip cards. It's, it's, they're very cool.

[Guest or Additional Host]

And if that's not enough, there are a wide variety of partnerships that Pantone has undertaken in recent years, like their collaboration with the cosmetics retailer Sephora on their Pantone Universe lipstick line, which of course you can wear when you are in Brussels. April, staying at the Pantone Hotel, which invites you to, quote, unquote, stay in color.

[April Callahan]

And you better bet that I look this up immediately. It's super cute. It situates seven different color palettes against that sort of white box modernist aesthetic. And it's super affordable. I was surprised to learn, I guess the rooms start at only €59 a night. I would totally, totally stay there if I was in Brussels. I've never actually been to Brussels, so I'd like to go and stay at the Pantone Hotel. So, lady listeners Catherine and Jenna, we hope that we answered your questions about the history of Pantone and the Pantone color of the year. This, the company is basically like the go to for color applications across the design industries. And they're still going strong after more than 50 years in the biz. And now their original 500 color offerings are now 2,500 more than 2,500 official Pantone colors. So I just want to say, Cass, on that note, I really want some of that Pantone Universe lipstick.

[Guest or Additional Host]

Yes, absolutely. And of course you love your lipsticks. I mean, I'm a little curious to know how many you have. At this point.

[April Callahan]

I have no idea. And frankly, I'm a little afraid to count. I'm just going to say there's a lot.

[Cassie Zachary]

Trust listeners. We've said on the show many times before that both Cass and I are big proponents of therapy. Therapy can help, but sometimes it's not the whole answer, which is where talkiatry comes in.

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[April Callahan]

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[April Callahan]

Speaking of color and makeup, you and I were speaking about this recently.

[Guest or Additional Host]

Yes. So I have been waiting for this opportunity and this was perfect to talk about this documentary that I recently saw, which was actually on the celebrity makeup artist Kevin Aucoin. It's a documentary called Kevin Aucoin, Beauty and the Beast and Me. And it's currently streaming on Netflix.

[April Callahan]

Yes. The film documents some meteoric career of celebrity makeup artist Kevin Aucoin, but not only his life and working in makeup, but also struggles with his personal demons that he carried. And he very tragically died at just the age of 40.

[Guest or Additional Host]

Right. And to say Kevin was beloved is a bit of an understatement. And this documentary is really a testament to that. It's full of interviews and featurettes with celebrities who are also his dear friends. After his death, hundreds of hours of video footage were discovered at his home because he was always filming when he was doing makeup, when he was working with all of these people. So he has these incredible intimate, behind the scenes footage of his makeup sessions with people like model and actress Annie McDowell, Amber Valletta, Naomi Campbell, Cindy Crawford. And he actually did Cindy's makeup for her very first Vogue cover.

[April Callahan]

At the height of Kevin's career, he was doing makeup for not only the top models, but also some of the most famous performers of the time, including Cher, Janet Jackson, Tina Turner, and Liza Minnelli. And he was also really good friends with Gwyne Paltrow. And she has said that, quote, women helped him get through the pain of his childhood. And what she's referencing there is that as a young gay man in the South, Kevin had a horrible time growing up with bullying. He received death threats at his school. So much so it got so bad that he was actually forced to drop out of school. And he said, quote, I didn't have any friends and I didn't have any support. The only thing I really had was Cher and Barbra Streisand and everything stereotypical gay kids have. Which is incredible because not very long after that, he was doing makeup for both of these women that he so revered.

[Guest or Additional Host]

It's a really great and documentary, and it includes interviews with many of these celebrities that knew and loved Kevin, but also with his parents. And we find out that Kevin was adopted, something he actually struggled with quite a lot throughout his life. But his adoptive parents were quite supportive of their son. And one of the most touching pieces from the film is an interview with his father, who talks about giving up going to church after the pastor told him that homosexuality was a sin. And he says, my religion changed because there was no way someone was going to tell me that something was wrong with my son because he was gay. So this film is more than the portrait of a famous makeup artist. It's the portrait of the man behind the fame. And I cannot recommend it enough.

[April Callahan]

Me too. Go check it out Cas. I think that does it. For this week's episode of Fashion History Mystery.

[Cassie Zachary]

Please head over to essedpodcast on Instagram or dressedpodcast, which is out the underscore on Facebook, to check out the.

[April Callahan]

Visual content associated with each week's episodes.

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Remember, we love hearing from you dressed listeners, so if you'd like to write to us, you can do so@hello dresshistory.com Dresshistory.com is also our website where you can sign up for our monthly newsletter, our in person tours and online fashion history courses. And there you can also check out whatever else we have up our finely tailored sleeves.

[April Callahan]

We get so many questions from you.

[Cassie Zachary]

All about our recommendations for fashion history.

[April Callahan]

Books, so if you're interested you can.

[Cassie Zachary]

Always find a link in our show notes to our bookshop.org bookshelf so that address is bookshop.org shop dressed and there you will find over 150 of our favorite fashion history titles.

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Thank you as always for tuning in and more dressed coming your way soon. The History of Fashion is a production of Dressed Media.