Colour specialist Pantone has announced Cloud Dancer as its 2026 colour of the year – an understated, greyish white hue chosen to signify a yearning for “a future free from toxicity and excess”.
Pantone 11-4201 Cloud Dancer was described by the Pantone Colour Institute as similar to a blank canvas.
Pantone has unveiled Cloud Dancer as its 2026 colour of the year
“Cloud Dancer is a lofty white that reads like a breath of fresh air,” said Pantone Colour Institute vice president Laurie Pressman.
“It speaks of our desire to live in a world that’s balanced, kind, and deeply human,” she told Dezeen.
The hue was described as “a breath of fresh air”
The institute is Pantone‘s trend forecasting consultancy. Since 1999, the team has selected an existing Pantone colour each year that it feels best represents both the mood of the current moment and the year ahead.
Pressman explained that the 2026 colour of the year was chosen as a collective reaction against feeling “overcommitted and overstimulated in our 24/7 hustle culture”.
Since 1999, Pantone has selected an annual colour
“Cloud Dancer expresses our aspiration for a future free from toxicity and excess,” she continued.
The vice president also said that the colour’s balance of both warm and cool undertones gives it a “natural and human quality”.
Ongoing research conducted by the Pantone Colour Institute throughout the year determines the selection
“Uncertain of what the future holds, underpinned by the advancements of AI, we are trying to find the place where we belong,” she said.
“Yearning for authentic human connections and real-life experiences, we want to share things without filters or spectacle, to rediscover the value of moments and find joy in life’s simple pleasures.”
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The institute conducts ongoing research throughout the year to determine the annual hue, spanning art, fashion, film and design, as well as technology, upcoming sporting events and shifting socio-economic conditions.
“We take the Pantone Colour of the Year selection process very seriously,” stressed Pressman. “The colour we select is not an arbitrary decision.”
Cloud Dancer was chosen as a subtle transition from last year’s Mocha Mousse
The vice president considered how the consumer landscape has changed since 1999, and weighed up whether an increasingly politicised global stage has affected how the annual colour is selected.
“The world getting more politically charged and polarised is one more manifestation of what people are looking for,” she said. “But we would not say it makes our selection process harder – it is just one more thing to consider.”
The colour features a balance of both warm and cool undertones that gives it a “natural and human quality”
Cloud Dancer was chosen as a subtle transition from last year’s Mocha Mousse – a chocolatey brown hue selected to reflect the importance of “little treat culture”.
Interiors expert Michelle Ogundehin shared an opinion piece on the 2025 choice, declaring Mocha Mousse “a classic exemplar of enshittification”.
The images are courtesy of Pantone.