In the early 1960s, the world of design was far from seamless. Communicating a specific hue across teams was practically impossible — what looked like a deep red on one end could turn out murky brown on another. Staring at the fresh ink on a sheet he had just printed, Lawrence Herbert was puzzled by this recurring problem. How he could communicate this exact color to a client across town was a question that stayed constantly on his mind.
The small print shop, based on the east side of New Jersey, was where it all began. Advertising agencies, clients and printers struggled endlessly over color inconsistencies, and it was an everyday frustration. Seeing both a challenge and an opportunity, Herbert came up with an idea: a universal color matching system that would allow anyone, anywhere, to reproduce the same color with precision. He printed the first prototype system and shared it with his collaborators and clients. For something that sounded like a simple idea, word spread quickly.
In 1963, Herbert ended up purchasing the company’s ink and printing division and officially introduced what would become the Pantone Matching System (PMS) — a revolutionary tool that gave designers and manufacturers a common language for color.
While the early days of Pantone’s adoption were gradual, it didn’t take long for industries like graphic design, fashion, product manufacturing, and interiors to recognize the value of a consistent, standardized system. Over time, Pantone evolved into a global authority on color, influencing everything from advertising campaigns to runway trends.
At the core of Pantone’s value is its ability to deliver absolute consistency. The system assigns unique numerical codes to colors, ensuring that the same shade can be reproduced exactly, regardless of material, location, or production method. Whether producing a brochure, creating a product line, or manufacturing branded merchandise, Pantone ensures the original creative vision stays intact.
Bridging the Color Gap
Graphic designers, in particular, rely on PMS standards to bridge the inevitable gap between digital and print media. On-screen colors can appear vivid but often fail to translate correctly to print without a physical standard. By referencing Pantone swatches, designers can communicate clearly with printers, ensuring every output — from business cards to billboards — reflects the intended color accurately.
Beyond technical precision, today Pantone company also plays a role in trendsetting. The Pantone Color of the Year announcement each year sparks shifts in fashion, branding, and interior design, offering a glimpse into emerging cultural moods and tastes.
Interesting Fact:
While many people casually use the word “hue” to mean simply “color,” it actually carries several layered definitions in design and color theory. At its core, hue refers to the dominant family of a color — the purest form without the influence of tint, tone, or shade. Primary colors like red, blue, and yellow, secondary colors like green and orange, and even tertiary blends are all categorized as hues based on their origins. However, in everyday use, hue can also describe a specific shade or variation within a color family. In psychology and color perception studies, hue even represents one of the key dimensions by which the human brain interprets and organizes color, influencing everything from emotional response to brand recognition.
Color in Branding
In branding, Pantone is a cornerstone of building strong visual consistency. Iconic brands like Tiffany & Co. owe part of their immediate recognition to a specific color hue carefully chosen and consistently applied. Pantone even created a vanity number for Tiffany & Co.; the color is called “1837 Blue,” named after Tiffany’s founding year. Behind these instantly recognizable colors is a discipline that uses Pantone standards to guarantee the brand looks the same on every product, in every ad, and across every platform.
Another strong example of Pantone’s role in brand consistency is Post-it®, whose identity is built around a carefully selected palette of Pantone colors. Post-it Brand Yellow (Pantone 1235c/116u), Process Yellow, Complement Yellow (Pantone 109c/108u), and Hero Yellow (Pantone 120c/127u) work together to create a vibrant and familiar look. Even subtle variations between the product and the brand mark are precisely managed with designated Pantone shades, ensuring that every sticky note, package, and advertisement feels unmistakably on-brand. Couple years ago, 3M’s Post-it collaborated with Pantone on sticky notes featuring Supernova Neons and Playful Primaries.
Interestingly, not every brand relies on Pantone to define their signature colors. Coca-Cola, for example, does not use an official PMS color for its famous red. Instead, they manage and reproduce their proprietary “Coca-Cola Red” internally — a color so iconic that it has become instantly recognizable worldwide without needing a Pantone match. In Coca-Cola’s case, the power of consistent use over generations has built a visual identity so strong that it stands on its own.
Pantone has also collaborated directly with cultural icons to create custom colors that capture their brand essence. In 2019, Pantone introduced Team Coco Orange for Conan O’Brien. “Good-natured and expansive, friendly and gregarious, Conan’s Team Coco Orange is an energizing and fearless orange tone with a touch of tang,” said Laurie Pressman, Vice President of the Pantone Color Institute, when the color was first announced. “Designed to be animated and spontaneous, Conan’s Team Coco Orange is instantly engaging and conveys a playful sense of fun.”
For us at ArtVersion, Pantone colors are foundational to how we approach brand identity design. When we craft a brand or refresh an existing one, every color choice is deliberate. The physical Pantone Reference Library guides — from color fans to chip books — are daily tools in our workflow. They allow us to select and communicate exact shades that strengthen brand recognition and deliver consistency across digital, print, and environmental applications. Every color we choose becomes a signature for the brands we design, carrying meaning, memory, and emotional resonance.
Color Inconsistencies
Even when using the same Pantone number, colors can look different depending on the material they are printed on. For example, Pantone 1235 C (coated) and Pantone 1235 U (uncoated) are technically based on the same color formula but can appear noticeably different to the eye. This happens because coated paper has a smooth, glossy surface that prevents ink from soaking into the paper fibers, making colors look sharper and more vibrant. Uncoated paper, on the other hand, absorbs more ink and diffuses the color, leading to a softer, often smoother appearance.
Understanding these material differences is crucial when specifying colors for everything from business cards to packaging — it ensures the final result matches the brand’s intended look and feel across every application. In fact, Pantone often adjusts the ink formulas slightly between coated and uncoated swatches to compensate for how the surface absorbs and reflects color. This ensures that, despite the natural differences in material texture, the color stays as visually consistent as possible across all mediums.
In 2022, a shift in how Pantone colors were accessed created new challenges for creative teams like ours. An unclear dispute between Adobe and Pantone led to the removal of previously available Pantone libraries from the Adobe Creative Suite. The new Pantone Connect subscription model was introduced, making it harder to keep the color libraries organized between clients, collaborators, and internal teams. For those of us who work with colors daily, justifying a monthly subscription was manageable, but in practice, we quickly realized that many client teams did not have access to these libraries, causing unnecessary friction.
Today, despite digital advancements, we still rely heavily on the physical Pantone Reference Library. There’s something irreplaceable about being able to touch, feel, and examine a color on paper in its natural form. In a world that increasingly lives online, those tangible moments often make all the difference in making sure a brand’s color story is told just right.
How to use Pantone Matching System (PMS)
For designers, using Pantone colors properly is not just about picking a swatch — it’s about maintaining precision and consistency throughout the entire design system and production process. Here’s a simple guide to getting it right:
1. Start with Physical Pantone Guides
Whenever possible, select colors from a physical Pantone Color Guide — not from a digital screen. Digital displays can vary widely in how they show color based on settings, brightness, and calibration. Viewing the color on a printed swatch ensures you are working with the truest version of the color.
2. Record the Exact Pantone Code
Always note the full Pantone code (including finish — for example, Pantone 1235 C for coated or Pantone 1235 U for uncoated paper). Different finishes can subtly affect how the color appears, especially in print applications. Being specific prevents confusion later in the production stages.
3. Communicate Pantone Codes in Brand Guidelines
When building brand standards or design systems, always include the Pantone codes alongside CMYK, RGB, and HEX values. This creates a clear reference across both digital and print workflows and ensures consistency across different production environments.
4. Use the Pantone Libraries in Design Software
If your design software (like Adobe Illustrator or Photoshop) has Pantone libraries installed, use them to select and apply colors directly in your files. If not, cross-reference your Pantone Color Bridge guides manually and create swatches based on official PMS values.
5. Proof on the Final Material
Before final production, ask for a color proof printed on the intended material — whether it’s paper, swag, or packaging. Colors can shift based on the substrate, so a final check is essential to make sure the Pantone shade appears as expected.
6. Maintain and Update Your Pantone Books
Pantone books age over time, and exposure to light and air can cause colors to shift slightly. Make sure to replace your reference guides every few years to ensure accuracy. Working with outdated color swatches, fan books, or color chips can introduce unintentional errors into your projects.
Bonus Tip:
Whenever you’re unsure, physically compare your project proofs to your Pantone swatches under natural daylight conditions. Colors can look different under artificial light sources, and natural light provides the truest comparison.
There is a Science Behind It
- Color is a human experience, shaped by perception and environment.
- Colorimetry provides the scientific foundation for measuring and standardizing color.
- Systems like Pantone offer tools for consistency, but individual perception varies.
- Monitor calibration is critical for accurate digital-to-physical color translation.
- Professional tools like spectrophotometers and colorimeters ensure color precision across materials.
- Leading companies like X-Rite and Datacolor provide essential technologies for color management.
- Consistency in color builds trust, strengthens branding, and enhances design impact.
Understanding how colors are communicated, standardized, and preserved is essential, but at the heart of it all lies a deeper truth: color is a human experience. This brings us to the science of colorimetry — the study of how color is measured and how it is perceived by the human eye.
While systems like Pantone give us the tools to standardize color across materials and media, color perception itself is subjective. Lighting conditions, surrounding colors, material textures, and even individual biology can affect how a color appears to each person. What one individual sees as a vibrant orange might appear slightly more muted to another. This is why we are so particular about color.
Designers minimize these variations by calibrating their monitors regularly. Calibration ensures that the colors displayed on screen are as close as possible to industry standards, creating a reliable foundation for color-critical work. Without calibration, screens can display colors inaccurately — shifting too warm, too cool, or too saturated — leading to mismatches between digital designs and final printed pieces. In our studios on most monitors we use professional calibration tools, including ubiquitous Datacolor’s Spider and X-Rite’s i1, to align our displays to trusted color profiles, helping ensure what we see on screen matches real-world outputs as closely as possible.
Beyond calibration, designers often rely on specialized color measurement tools to ensure absolute accuracy. Devices like spectrophotometers and colorimeters are essential for capturing and comparing precise color data across different materials and lighting conditions. These tools allow designers to measure physical samples against digital color standards, helping eliminate guesswork in color-critical workflows. Companies like X-Rite, a global leader in color science technology and the parent company of Pantone, provide industry-standard instruments that bridge the gap between physical and digital color spaces. By combining these technologies with a deep understanding of color perception, designers are able to build brand experiences that remain consistent, reliable, and impactful across every touchpoint.
Interesting Fact
Color isn’t just seen — it’s measured. In professional environments, precise color measurement is critical to maintaining consistency across different materials, devices, and production processes. Instruments like spectrophotometers and colorimeters are used to capture exact color values, gathering data far beyond what the human eye can perceive. At ArtVersion, we not only rely on this technology — we also have the privilege of working with Datacolor, a global leader in color management solutions and one of our valued clients. By using Datacolor instruments, we ensure our color work meets the highest standards, accurately calibrating displays, verifying printed colors, and matching physical samples with digital references to create brand experiences that stay consistent and true across every platform.
At ArtVersion, it’s this balance between precision and perception that drives every brand experience we create. In our day-to-day work helping brands create experiences, we are constantly aware of these nuances. Designing visual identities is not just about matching a color swatch; it’s about understanding how that color will be perceived in different environments, how it will make people feel, and how it will support the brand’s larger story.
By blending the precision of tools like Pantone’s PMS with an understanding of human perception through science, we help brands build experiences that are not only visually consistent, but also emotionally resonant — connecting more deeply with audiences and standing out in a crowded, fast-moving world.