"Mimosa Embodies Hopefulness and Reassurance in a Climate of Change"

While browsing, looking for inspiration, and justification, for the use the exceptionally bright (read: potentially-glaring-to-the-point-of-blinding-if-used-in-excess) 2009 Pantone color of the Year- mimosa - for the design class assignment, I need look no further than Pantone's description of the color itself:

"Mimosa Embodies Hopefulness and Reassurance in a Climate of Change"

And indeed, flashes of mimosa pop up in the otherwise recession acknowledging and austere palettes of the Spring 09 shows for Prada, Hermes, Dior, and Vuitton, among others. The main page for the well built NYT section devoted to the collections can be found right here.

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Further linking together my two loves, economy and design, superstar Michael Beirut shares his wisdom about how a designer can expect to see their workload behave, and helpful tips (applicable to freelancers of any field) on managing business during the downturn here.

Even more evidence of the bond between design and economy: Beirut links to an article by Michael Cannell in a recent NYT, "Design loves a depression". The article builds a sunny prediction: the current worldwide evaporation of wealth just might encourage designers to turn their attentions away from designing 10k couches and toward more humanistic goals like energy, infrastructure, housing and city planning. He says, "This kind of innovation means rethinking the economy of production and distribution."

Cannell goes on to say, "Designers are good at coming up with new ways of looking at complex problems." With Bernake and Paulson desperatly throwing sand at the inferno of costs inflicted by the robber barons of the most recent boom, I'll dive into my work on design with a hopeful and reassuring mimosa in hand.