Fruit flavored gelato – the symbol of the colors of summer in Italy. Then there’s the blue of the Mediterranean Sea, the gold of sandy beaches and the multicolored choreography of beach umbrellas dancing along the coast.
In Italy, the image of summer is one that exudes the scents of ripe tomatoes and basil. We eat pasta with fried eggplant, and no one cares how hot it is outside; we like sharing piece of shade while we talk about other people’s love lives and the songs of summer that get stuck in our heads. Then there’s fashion – when summer comes we can stop defending ourselves from the cold and getting dressed becomes a game with rules that can be very imaginative.
In the 80s, the streets were full of bright colored sweatshirts, the preppy look with shorts and fierce suntans. The 90s were less colorful, with that sultry, slightly elusive Calvin Klein look. So it went, until now, the era when color trends yielded to the uniqueness of individual humans, something that had never been so powerful and strongly perceived.
Then came armocromia. It uses our skin tone, hair color, eye color and the way they contrast to define which season we belong to and which colors suit us best. Each season is an incredible rainbow of nuances that we can creatively combine to come up with choices and outfits we may never have thought to wear before.
For example, the summer palette is full of neon colors, of crazy oranges and lemon yellows, of shocking pinks and baby blues. Think of Barbie’s wardrobe – the one that we all envied when we were little and that seems to be coming back into vogue with Greta Gerwig’s movie.
More than any other palette, summer is the one that makes you want to play with colors and celebrate that extemporary lightheartedness that we experience in the season, that desire to be unforgettable, as precious as gold and as fascinating as the ocean. Summer is like a jewel that someone gives you with the promise of being happy, the promise that outside, the sun is shining.
