When did color fall out of favor?

[Rob Hall]

I've had mostly dark metallic colored cars over the years (dark gray, dark blue, burgundy), with a one pearl white car, a couple silver cars, one bright red one, and one two tone (gold & brown).   I'm thinking i'd like something dark brown or dark red in my next car.  Preferably with a lighter interior.  I love greens, esp. dark ones, but there seems to be very little going on in green currently.

Edited August 2, 2016 by Rob Hall

[StevenGuthmiller]

I liked it better when colorful cars were the rule, not the exception. How cool is this?

Perfect example.

Here we have one of those "boring" gray cars.

But that splash of color, & a beautifully complimentary color, makes it look as classy as can be!

 

Steve

[Art Anderson]

Multiple colors on cars pretty much went out of fashion by the late 1960's, with changes in styling leaving no chrome spears to make logical color dividing lines, roofs that faded smoothly into the lower body making two-tone paint jobs impractical to do.  Also, the rather loud colors of the 1950's had gone by the wayside for just about everything by the late 1960's as well.

This wasn't limited to personal automobiles either--houses began to be painted in subdued colors (remember "Moss Green" everything, followed by all those "earth tones"?).

Art

[Richard Bartrop]

I liked it better when colorful cars were the rule, not the exception. How cool is this?

There were some nice colour combos, but I'm afraid we're going to have to agree to disagree on this particular on, though black and silver can look very classy on the right car.

You did see a revival of two toned paint jobs in the late 70s and early 80s.   These might work on something like the latest generation of Cadillacs, or anything else with lots of creases.

[Harry P.]

Those all look good to me, and way more visually interesting than what's on the road these days.

[Brian Austin]

But there have been some nifty colors out there including some oranges/bronzes in the past few years.  

And then there's Ferrari.  So far of recent offerings I've seen either red or charcoal locally.  What have you seen?

Generally, a lot of thought goes into the color choice for products/fashions, trying to divine the "hot" colors for the period of time in the future the product is supposed to launch.

 

[Snake45]

Saw a beautiful burnt orange metallic on a late-model Ram Daytona truck yesterday. It was spectacular!

[JTalmage]

I like colorful cars... but for some reason I keep buying black. 

bad pic obviously.. but here was my '89 Mustang... after I wrecked it of course.

Then I bought this

Then I bought a dark gray Lincoln

Then I bought a black truck...

But, I keep the two tone alive!

[peteski]

I like colors too but I keep buying white cars - to me any car looks elegant in white, and on white (unlike on black) dirt and dust doesn't show up).  I also own a Caddy which is nice metallic blue with white Landau top and white interior.

 

While not very many, there are still wild colors available for  contemporary cars. I see some bright oranges, blues, lime-greens, and even wild purples (all metallic). Also many new muscle cars come in pretty vivid colors.

[om617]

Not a fan of pastel colors if they arent metallics. Pink,yellow and orange are my least favorite colors.

I like the late 60s,early 70s brown and diffrent shades of green metallics seen on many Mopars.

Brown metallics are getting very popular again.

[Tom Geiger]

I was thinking about this thread yesterday.  We went to a nice local restaurant that has outdoor seating for Happy Hour.  There are a mess of parking spaces out front where people pull up in convertibles and old cars.  One day there was a '32 Ford street rod and an Avanti.   So I pull up in my bright red PT Cruiser  convertible with the top down. I'm hoping to park in one of those visible spaces.... nope!   Every one of them was filled with a big black SUV.  It looked like fricken Russia!   Then the dullards who drive them would start them up and sit there (facing tables) with the engines roaring, while they waited for the rest of their brood. My favorite was the little blond mom who also had her headlights on, glaring in seated people's faces while she checked her phone.

[Art Anderson]

Automakers have almost always chosen, and still do choose,colors they believe will sell cars.  The car public buys cars in colors they like for whatever the reason-"Make A Statement", "Follow The Crowd", even to just "Blend In".  (Believe it or not--the 1960's saw the same sort of "conformity" we see today with the masses of seemingly bland neutral metallic colors--in the years 1963-at least 1968, the most popular car color was........."White"!  Not that there weren't other color choices, there were--but white was the best selling color of that era, to the point that even the Wall Street Journal observed that the best-selling car in the US (this was about 1965 or 1966) was a white 4-door Chevrolet Impala Sedan.  Sure, there were other colors out there, but white ruled--which could have been a carryover of the middle 1950's almost "fad" that if you ordered your new car with a white roof, it would be cooler inside in the heat of summer (it may have been, but my then boyhood body apparently didn't notice any difference--a hot car interior was a hot car interior!).

Of course, the 1950's and 60's were still the era when a large portion of new car buyers traded perhaps every 2-3 years, well before whatever color their cars were painted, noticeable sun-fading had yet to be visible (certainly away from the Sun Belt)--but people who tended to keep their new car purchases significantly longer, there was a prejudice against brighter, louder colors, and even a prejudice against metallic colors by many people due to UV deterioration of the carrier (this exposed the metallic powder or chip, dulling the finish badly, and upon frequent waxing and polishing, actually exposed the metallic pigments to the point of giving the car a prematurely worn appearance--the years before UV blockers in automotive paint).

Some here have mentioned that a century ago there were brightly painted cars--yes, there were a few, but the vast majority of pre-1942 cars were painted darker, muted colors.   Prior to DuPont's developing a sprayable nitrocellulose lacquer (and the introduction of true paint sprayguns right after WW-I), cars were painted in a labor-intensive process that could literally take weeks of drying before any secondary colors or even polishing out could take place.  Those early enamels were varnish-based, and anyone who's seen older homes with old varnished wood trim in their interiors should remember how that varnish tended to shrink, split and crack with age.  To be sure, there were cars of those years whose paint seemed to defy age, but then very few people parked those cars every day out in the elements--garages for the middle class, carriage houses for the well-to-do (who also had household staff to keep them clean and shiny.  Still, not all that many contemporary photos or even films show but a very few cars that were painted in lighter, brighter colors.

Enter the 1950's:  After more than 30 years of world wars, interspersed by a great economic depression, people of all ages wanted something more than dark colored cars (and white-lead painted clapboard houses (or white trim on brick or stone houses).  The darker, more somber interior colors gave way to lighter and brighter, seemingly overnight, people started painting their houses in a near kaleidoscope of colors, mostly pastels to be sure but nonetheless, colors never before considered entered the scene--in just about all aspects of life.

Fast forward to today--it's not often you see any houses (for example) in new subdivisions painted any color other than some shade of "earth tones"; the pink with grey or black accents (middle 1950's), or the wilder colors of the 60's, the moss greens circa 1970-75, have petty much gone away.  Tastes change, as tastes have always changed, with regard to colors people choose for the surroundings, the trappings of their lives.

Art

[Snake45]

Believe it or not--the 1960's saw the same sort of "conformity" we see today with the masses of seemingly bland neutral metallic colors--in the years 1963-at least 1968, the most popular car color was........."White"!  Not that there weren't other color choices, there were--but white was the best selling color of that era, to the point that even the Wall Street Journal observed that the best-selling car in the US (this was about 1965 or 1966) was a white 4-door Chevrolet Impala Sedan.  Sure, there were other colors out there, but white ruled--

Art

I remember reading that article, or something very similar in Motor Trend or Popular Science or something of the sort. And IIRC, the second most popular color was blue. Don't recall any particular specification or details about that "blue" so I imagine that all shades of blue were lumped in together. And, at that time, it wasn't uncommon for a carmaker to offer a Dark Blue, a Medium Blue, and a Light Blue in the same model year--and maybe also a Turquoise and/or Aqua shade which could have also qualified as "blue" if one wanted to score it that way. Oh yeah, lotta blues running around in the '60s.

[Art Anderson]

I remember reading that article, or something very similar in Motor Trend or Popular Science or something of the sort. And IIRC, the second most popular color was blue. Don't recall any particular specification or details about that "blue" so I imagine that all shades of blue were lumped in together. And, at that time, it wasn't uncommon for a carmaker to offer a Dark Blue, a Medium Blue, and a Light Blue in the same model year--and maybe also a Turquoise and/or Aqua shade which could have also qualified as "blue" if one wanted to score it that way. Oh yeah, lotta blues running around in the '60s.

True, of course.  One other thing to bear in mind--modern mass-production doesn't allow for the ease of color changes on the painting line, due to the much faster pace of production, or so it seems to me.  It almost means a change of colors in the robotic spray painters, then a run of a single color to get the color wanted for inventory.  "Back in the day" it was lots easier I think--I remember my tour of the St Louis Chevrolet Assembly Plant, and seeing an array of spray guns in the spray booths, one for each color--all the painters had to do was pick whichever color gun the build sheet called for, and they were on their way.  So, modern robotics may have a lot to do with the smaller color selections today, and the upcharge that comes with some lesser-used but wanted colors?

Art

[Snake45]

I remember my tour of the St Louis Chevrolet Assembly Plant, and seeing an array of spray guns in the spray booths, one for each color--all the painters had to do was pick whichever color gun the build sheet called for, and they were on their way.  

Art

I've seen T-shirt artists in beach boardwalk shops do the same thing with airbrushes. Had seven or eight of 'em hooked up, loaded up with the most-used colors.

[Tom Geiger]

 

Fast forward to today--it's not often you see any houses (for example) in new subdivisions painted any color other than some shade of "earth tones"; the pink with grey or black accents (middle 1950's), or the wilder colors of the 60's, the moss greens circa 1970-75, have petty much gone away.  Tastes change, as tastes have always changed, with regard to colors people choose for the surroundings, the trappings of their lives.

The issue with new homes today is that they are not painted.  Most homes come with vinyl siding, and are limited to the selection that the developer's designer has chosen for that subdivision.  I know a friend of mine buying a home in one was upset because the builder wouldn't allow two houses next to one another be the same color, and of course the lot he wanted had the color he wanted already picked by his next door neighbor.

In many parts of the country, newer developments have Homeowners Associations that usually keep to the neighborhood conformity standards set by the developer.  The rules for mine are pretty much boilerplate, and have been updated to allow newer types of fencing etc that didn't exist when the homes were built. 

[Snake45]

The issue with new homes today is that they are not painted.  Most homes come with vinyl siding, and are limited to the selection that the developer's designer has chosen for that subdivision.  I know a friend of mine buying a home in one was upset because the builder wouldn't allow two houses next to one another be the same color, and of course the lot he wanted had the color he wanted already picked by his next door neighbor.

In many parts of the country, newer developments have Homeowners Associations that usually keep to the neighborhood conformity standards set by the developer.  The rules for mine are pretty much boilerplate, and have been updated to allow newer types of fencing etc that didn't exist when the homes were built. 

Just more of the "Shut up and get in line, Sheeple" mentality they're trying to breed into everyone these days.

Or as one of my favorite radio personalities, Tammy Bruce, so eloquently put it once: "Your job is not to ask questions, Little Hamster. Your job is just to turn the dam wheel."

[bbowser]

 So, modern robotics may have a lot to do with the smaller color selections today, and the upcharge that comes with some lesser-used but wanted colors?

 

This seems to me to be a logical progression, along the lines of Henry's "any color so long as it's black" early production line.  That plus it's hard to do a 2-tone egg 

[dptydawg]

Other than an oatmeal coloured Grand Cherokee, that the price was very right on, everry vehicle that I have owned has been red, green. blue or purple including these two. I hate blah coloured vehicles. I can't figure out why anyone would drive one in an Ontario winter. 

Carl

[StevenGuthmiller]

Just more of the "Shut up and get in line, Sheeple" mentality they're trying to breed into everyone these days.

Or as one of my favorite radio personalities, Tammy Bruce, so eloquently put it once: "Your job is not to ask questions, Little Hamster. Your job is just to turn the dam wheel."

I think those homeowners associations were originally designed to deal with issues like this.

 

 

But as with everything else, you give people a little power & it goes to their head.

 

Steve

[Harry P.]

Some here have mentioned that a century ago there were brightly painted cars--yes, there were a few...

There sure were!

[Joe Handley]

I was at the dealership today to get an oil change before work and they did have a bunch of silver, white, black, and grey vehicles on the lot, but there were Challengers and a 4dr Wrangler in the new B5 blue, a bright red Hellcat and Grand Caravan, Plum Crazy Charger and Wrangler, a couple Durangos in a nice shade of Maroon, a couple Jeeps in almost an Olive Drab (but darker) green, a couple current body style 200 sedans in that really nice electric blue.

 

Of course, I hit the tollway to run from North Aurora to Lombard, color kinda dropped off, although I did see two nearly identical, wet cement grey Hyundai Sonata sedans (well, I think they were Sonatas) almost collide near then 355-Joliet exit

[Lunajammer]

Another case in point. Ford announces thirteen F-150 colors for 2015 including four new ones.

Edited August 8, 2016 by Lunajammer

[10thumbs]

Just today I had a nice little cruise with the Vespa over the countryside and then coming back using a shortcut, drove down our local "new car alley", an array of dealerships.  French, Jap and German car dealers.  Since this thread I'm taking notice of car colors. 

The lots were full of very colorful brand new cars to be seen!

The most colorful were those Jap and Korean ones.  Just no one drives those in Germany. 

[SfanGoch]

My first car while in Germany was a pumpkin orange 1972 VW K70 L. It ran for exactly as long as one would expect a $250 car to, not very.