Colour in Architecture takes many forms and can be expressed or used in wildly different ways.

One of my earliest public commissions was the Darcy St + Laneway Activation in Parramatta. The project in question was commissioned by Parramatta Council for building assets they owned and planned to demolish. This project gave me the opportunity to destroy the buildings first, by using paint instead of a sledgehammer.

Trauma Informed Design shares many principles with Biophilic Design and as I learn more about both, it’s increasingly clear to me (and backed up by a growing body of scientific studies) that colour plays a central role in design for health and well-being. Human beings have evolved in close and complex relationship with the natural world, and our brains function better when stimulated and soothed by interaction with complex natural systems.

It’s not our eyes that see colour, it’s our brains. And we don’t see colour objectively, we see it through a lens of culture, memory, fashion, personal and social history; we see colours in relation to each other.

‘Warm Vessel’ is the name of a recent project in Darlinghurst, in which I was asked to propose a colour strategy for a small courtyard garden. This involved painting the back walls of the terrace house, the side boundary walls and the façade of the studio/garage that formed the rear boundary and enclosed the courtyard.

How often do we say to our clients, this might not work? A few days after a very bold colour concept had been accepted by our client, the architect called me and asked, “Sonia, how confident are you that this is actually going to work?”

There are colours that are inherently unsuitable for architecture, but white is not one of them, white is very useful.

As you may know - I am not a fan of stark whites. Whilst the colour white has its uses and place in architecture, I strongly object to its use as a ‘given’, or a default colour.

Sydney’s golden sandstone is the starting point for any contextually sensitive building colour palette in the city. Meaning, if you use white on a building in Sydney, make it a warm white. For black, make it a warm black.