A plate with mashed potatoes, tomato, asparagus, and a blue steak

How Do You Like Your Steak? Rare, Medium, or Bright Blue?

In 1973, an experiment with dyed food and colorful lights had participants vomiting up their half-finished meals. But did it really happen?
A Spectro-Chrome, c. 1925

Colorful Lights to Cure What Ails You

Between 1920 and the 1960s, tens of thousands of people received treatment with a Spectro-Chrome to address various ailments.

How Rocks and Minerals Play with Light to Produce Breathtaking Colors

Rocks and minerals don’t simply reflect light. They play with it and interact with light as both a wave and a particle.

Elements of Design: Spotlight on Color

Color, like line, shape, texture, and the other elements of art and design, communicates meaning and creates visually compelling experiences. Here's how.
From Home Suggestions, 1921

How American Consumers Embraced Color

Vivid hues in everyday products became eye-popping reality in the early twentieth century.
A red popsicle beginning to melt

The Buggy Truth about Natural Red Dye

The slightly disgusting secret ingredient that has historically made food dye, lipstick, and even the cloaks of Roman Catholic cardinals so vibrant.
A peacock

Green Birds Aren’t Really Green

Some of the most dazzling coloration you see in birds doesn’t actually exist.
Sir Charles Knowles, an officer of the Royal Navy

Colonialism Created Navy Blue

The indigo dye that created the Royal Navy's signature uniform color was only possible because of imperialism and slavery.
Geranium

Why Victorian Gardeners Loathed Magenta

For decades, British and American gardeners avoided magenta flowers. The color had associations with the unnatural and the poisonous.