GetInterwoven, Author at Interwoven

Decoding Color Forecasting: The Art and Science of Predicting Color Trends

We use color forecasts for nearly every project at Interwoven because we know that product designers ignore them at their own peril. Color is a powerful aspect of product design, and we’ve all had the experience of making a purchase (or deciding not to make a purchase) based on color. While easy to dismiss for those who don’t know the research and analytics behind these forecasts, color trends are big, big business, and they are important commercial tools precisely because they successfully anticipate the desires, especially the future desires, of consumers. Research conducted by yarn and textile manufacturers, fiber producers, retail groups, and trade fairs consistently demonstrates that the first response from customers, whether textile buyers or retail shoppers, is to color. This Insight article will dig into what color forecasting is, what goes into generating a color forecast, the value color forecasts have to offer, and how we can use them in the design process.

What is a Color Forecast?

Color is a potent language of expression and emotion, and the best designers learn to speak this language to elevate their work. Color forecasting is a multifaceted process that blends artistry and analytics to anticipate the hues that will shape the future of fashion and design. Anchored in strategic research and cultural insight, color forecasting is indispensable for designers and retailers seeking to stay ahead of the curve in an increasingly dynamic commercial landscape.

Color forecasting involves predicting which colors will be popular in the future, enabling proactive decision-making in creating collections that resonate with consumer preferences. The process involves delving into current trends, cultural influences, and the psychology of color, all while considering the seasonal and environmental dynamics that shape color preferences. A forecast typically reflects a specific area of the market, and has a time horizon that aligns with that market. For example, a women’s athletic wear color forecast might look a year ahead while a forecast for sport utility vehicles might look 2-3 years ahead to accommodate a longer production schedule. Prominent color forecasting services include Worth Global Style Network [WGSN], the International Color Institute [ICA], and the Pantone Color Institute. Access to the forecasts requires a membership and fees, reflecting the value of such services.

designer points to color on swatch card — image via iStock

More Than a Sales Pitch

Skeptics of color forecasting argue that it primarily serves as a mechanism to reignite consumer interest in fashion and products on a seasonal basis, ultimately increasing sales. While color forecasting definitely holds significance in retail and manufacturing, the rationale behind the selection of specific colors often transcends commercial motivations.

Long before the formalization of color forecasting as a discipline, individuals selected and created colors for various applications, ranging from clothing to décor. Early color trends emerged as a result of innovative dyeing techniques and societal preferences rather than strategic marketing. For instance, in the post-War era, Americans gravitated towards cheerful pastel tones as a departure from the somber hues prevalent during wartime. These soft colors symbolized a renewed sense of optimism and vitality, reflecting broader societal sentiments of the time.

Developments in Technicolor in the 1930s revolutionized color trends, popularizing vibrant and vivid hues in cinema and beyond. This technological innovation allowed luminous costumes worn by iconic figures like Marilyn Monroe and Grace Kelly to captivate audiences in full color for the first time, sparking a cultural fascination with bold and dynamic palettes.

Currently, color trends increasingly serve as reflections of broader societal, cultural, and even political movements. During the pandemic, consumers exhibited a preference for earthy and calming colors over the previously favored ultra-bright and neon hues, reflecting a collective desire for solace and grounding in uncertain times.

As the influence of color on consumer behavior continues to evolve, the color forecasting industry integrates insights from history, psychology, and societal dynamics to anticipate future trends. Color forecasters offer retailers strategic guidance on selecting colors that resonate with consumers’ emotional and cultural sensibilities.

Navigating the Color Forecasting Process

As with so many skills in the realm of design, color forecasting is as much a technical skill as it is an art. The journey begins with thorough research into the current color landscape, identifying patterns and trends that serve as the foundation for future predictions. The process unfolds in a systematic manner, guided by research, analysis, and intuition:

Research: The process begins with an exploration of current color trends across fashion, art, and design landscapes. By dissecting the prevailing hues and identifying emerging patterns, forecasters lay the groundwork for informed predictions.
Analysis: Armed with a wealth of data, forecasters analyze current trends, seeking patterns and shifts in color preferences. By discerning the nuances of consumer behavior and cultural influences, forecasters gain insights into the evolving color landscape.
Forecast: Drawing upon their research and analysis, forecasters venture into the realm of prediction, envisioning the colors that will dominate future seasons. By considering seasonal dynamics, historical trends, and emerging influences, forecasters craft palettes that reflect what’s to come.
Test and Adjust: The predictions undergo scrutiny as forecasters test them against real-world applications, from fashion shows to editorial spreads. Any necessary adjustments are made based on feedback and emerging trends, ensuring the accuracy and relevance of the forecasts.

The Value of Color Forecasting

The scope of color forecasting extends beyond clothing to encompass accessories, footwear, jewelry, cosmetics, and beyond. Each category presents unique trends and color palettes, requiring tailored forecasts to meet consumer demands. By accurately predicting future color trends, designers and retailers can create collections that resonate across diverse product categories, driving consumer engagement and market success. Here are a few reasons designers and retailers find color forecasts so valuable.

Staying Ahead of Trends: By anticipating future color trends, designers and retailers can stay ahead of the curve, creating collections that resonate with consumers’ evolving preferences.
Enhancing Brand Identity: Strategic alignment with forecasted colors strengthens brand identity and fosters consumer engagement, distinguishing brands in a competitive market landscape.
Optimizing Production Processes: Accurate forecasting streamlines production processes, minimizing waste and optimizing resource allocation, enhancing operational efficiency and sustainability.
Driving Economic Growth: As a driver of consumer demand and market trends, color forecasting fuels innovation and economic growth, shaping the trajectory of the fashion industry.

Using a Color Forecast

Color forecasting involves selecting ranges of colors predicted for a particular product or market at a specific time in the future. Many color forecasts are tailored to specific product ranges (men’s knitwear, sport utility vehicles), but most will display three color groupings — lights, mediums, and darks. These groups typically include several colors known as classics (colors accepted over a long period, such as camel, navy, bottle green, and black). As consumers don’t constantly replace everything, color ranges for a specific season must consider previous season’s colors as well as new ‘fashion’ colors. Any color palette typically includes some of the previous season’s fashion colors, the new season’s fashion colors, and some classics within its lights, mediums, and darks.

Designers take the same approach, reviewing the color forecasts that are relevant for their product category and that have a timeline that aligns with their desired product launch date. Often, a designer will review their product category as well as tangential or related product categories to get a broader sense of the trends across an industry. These color candidates are assessed for relevance and suitability to the project, and a selection of them become part of a shortlist for the final palette, typically with a selection of light, medium, and dark tones, just like the forecast itself. Building a color palette is like putting together a puzzle, finding just the right combination of tones for the project at hand. The shortlist is rearranged and tweaked in various combinations as many times as needed to reach a final palette, often with mockups and material selection influencing the decision.

A Colorful Horizon

Numerous factors influence a consumer’s color choices. With increasing consumer awareness regarding color use, it is crucial for companies to comprehend these factors and their impact on their specific market. Marketers must understand how color affects consumers and color forecasting to provide appropriate colors for their market. Even a slight difference in shade from what the consumer expects can be disastrous for the manufacturer. Color forecasting is an indispensable tool in the arsenal of designers and retailers, guiding them through the dynamic landscape of design. By deciphering the language of color, forecasters illuminate the path forward, enabling proactive decision-making and creative innovation.

Check out the rest of our Insight series to learn more about the design industry. Sign up for our newsletter and follow us on Instagram and LinkedIn for design news, multi-media recommendations, and to learn more about product design and development!

A Q&A with Color Expert Rebeccah Pailes-Friedman

A Q&A with Color Expert Rebeccah Pailes-Friedman

Spotlight articles shine a light on designers and design materials we admire. We ask designers about their work, their design journey, and what inspires them. In this issue we speak to Interwoven’s founder and principal designer, Rebeccah Pailes-Friedman, a design consultant and educator with expertise in wearable technology, functional apparel, and soft goods design. In addition to her work at Interwoven, Rebeccah Pailes-Friedman is a co-founder of SEArch+, Space Exploration Architecture, a professor of industrial design at Pratt Institute, and worked for over 20 years as a corporate Design Director for premium athletic brands, including Champion, Fila, and Nike. She is the author of Smart Textiles for Designers: Inventing the Future of Fabrics and speaks internationally on design and innovation. She also recently launched a handmade ceramics company. She is passionate about color and it shows in everything she does. We asked her about her color design process, the cultural context of color, and how to be an advocate for color.

Portrait of designer Rebeccah Pailes-Friedman — *Photo courtesy of Rebeccah Pailes-Friedman.*

Q: When do color considerations come into the design process for you?

A: I want to back up because I think it’s got to be said that I absolutely love color. It’s my favorite part of the design process. So when I think about integrating it into my process, it’s more like my process starts with color. Not only does it define the context but it also can set the mood, it can determine your very first impression of the product or environment or whatever it is you’re experiencing. Color is almost on a gut level. The first reaction that you have is going to be in response to the color, the texture, and the materials, they’re intertwined.

When I think about color, I start with a mood. I think, What is the mood that I want to feel when I’m looking at this product or this room or this environment? Once I have the mood, I start thinking about the colors that inspire that emotion, and then I start to analyze. If it’s a product for a client, I ask, Is this going to hit the right demographic? Is this going to communicate the right look and feel? But all of that stuff comes after the first initial emotional reaction to the color.

Q: What role does cultural context and user demographics play in your color palette development process?

A: Cultural context is core to the development of a product. It’s important because you want a product to be successful. When I was design director at Nike and I was developing the color story for a product, I would determine where and in what market that product was being sold. Even just in the United States there are micro markets. What should the palette be for a group of stores in the south of the United States? How is that different from the Pacific Northwest? How is that different from the New England region? Everybody has a different take on what feels culturally appropriate in that area, and you have to understand these nuances so that you can build a color palette that will answer to all of those different demographics. And this is not just in the United States, it’s global. In the Far East, there’s a different sort of flavor to color. It could be as fundamental as the quality of light. Depending on how close you are to the equator or how the Earth is rotating, the quality of light can really make a difference in the way that you perceive color. It can also be influenced by the vegetation in the area. Parks look different when you’re near the equator than they do when you’re in New England, so your idea of a green palette is different. All of these things play into determining the colors that people are going to be most receptive to.

Q: Could you walk us through your process for researching potential color directions for a project?

A: There’s research and there’s inspiration. I’m a big believer in using forecasting in my research. I don’t just randomly pick a gray, the classic black-gray-white pop-up color palette. I start by thinking about the colors that have been most popular in the past three to five years. Forecasts predict trending color for anywhere between one and three years out. Where do they see color going? What do I see when I look at retail product? Each one of those is an area of research. There’s the color forecast. There’s historical reference of color progression. And then there’s the context of what is happening currently in the market. I take all of those things into consideration, then I mix it with inspiration. The inspiration is: what do I personally love? What am I trending towards and in terms of the colors that I’m finding interesting? Then I meld those two together and plunk it into the cultural context of where I think the product is going to be.

Q: How do you balance insights from color forecasting with insights from landscape surveys, design constraints, and client preferences to determine a color direction for a product? How do you weigh the importance of each element of the decision?

A: The hardest thing for clients—when they’re thinking about color and don’t really have a lot of experience with color—is being comfortable with risk. Most people that are launching a product want it to be successful, so they tend to be conservative on the color front and they’ll want it in the most basic colors. That’s why there are so many products that are white or black or gray, because those are the most basic. I like to tell a story around color. I build evidence for a narrative of why these colors are good. That evidence can be successful products that have used color, and it may be a more risky approach than the client might have imagined. If I do a good enough job telling the story, they’ll take a chance. A really good example of that is the pop of yellow we used for HeroWear. I knew that they wanted a black and gray product and I thought, That’s not going to stand out in the marketplace. Then I thought about all the different pop colors that might be suitable. I realized that the best way to tell that story was around how that product is built for safety and how safety is associated with yellow. I started doing research into the particular type of yellow, hunting for a yellow that I thought would be brand appropriate for them: friendly and sunny but not necessarily danger-related. That’s how we developed that yellow color that we suggested for the HeroWear Apex Exosuit.

Q: What methods do you use to communicate color choices effectively with clients or stakeholders who don’t necessarily speak the language of color?

A: I spend a lot of time building the palette. I’m constantly looking at color and really thinking about how to develop it. Then the narrative is important, but showing examples of how the color could be used on particular products is critical for people to understand how a color palette could be applied. So there’s the development of the color palette, then there’s the narrative around the importance of that color palette, but the most important thing is the practical application; how that color palette can be applied to that particular product. And ‘product’ might be more than just the physical product. It could also be the branding and the marketing. Showing applications becomes a concrete way for the client to understand how we would want to use the color.

If I just showed a color palette, which is boxes of color with descriptions underneath, it’s really hard to understand what that means. Most people are literal, they see a box of color and they imagine the product painted that color. I need to show them a vision of just a hit of pink on the lining in this particular piece, so it will be a surprise when the client goes to put it on or take it off. It builds on the narrative but also shows the context of how the color would be applied. That’s critical for the client to understand not only how the color palette was made and why it’s important, but also how we are going to use it. That gives them the comfort level to maybe take a color risk that they wouldn’t necessarily have considered otherwise.

For example, when we were asked to come up with a number of color combinations for a cooler product, I thought about a dark combination, a light combination, and a neutral combination. A combination for a person who drives a big pickup truck, a combination for someone who’s going to the beach in the Hamptons…colorways that would be appropriate for all of these different user contexts. When we showed them to the client, they responded quite well to three or four of the different colorways. I think that’s the most important thing, to show how the color would be used.

Q: What considerations do you take into account when designing for accessibility and inclusivity, ensuring that color choices are inclusive for all users?

A: That’s really a great question. Color is understood on a spectrum, and everybody understands color in a different way. When we talk about inclusivity, we have to think about people who are hyper color sensitive—and I would say that I fall into that category—as well as those who are less color sensitive, as well as those who are color blind, and can’t see much in terms of the contrast between red and green. That’s an especially difficult color combination for people who are color blind, and there are a surprising number of people who are color blind. For most people who aren’t in the creative profession, it’s not something that affects them except when they have to go pick out their clothing in the morning. But there are a surprising number of designers who are color blind. One of the things I try to do is have a sense of contrast. When somebody is less color sensitive, they really rely on the contrast between the colors as much as they do the color shift.

The question is, how can you create products that speak with elegance and feeling and still have enough contrast so that people of all different abilities can process the surface and texture and composition of that product?

Q: To what extent is your hyper sensitivity to color ingrained as opposed to something developed over time as a designer?

A: I think I was born this way. I can share an anecdote. When I was maybe six, my mom was putting new wallpaper up in one of the rooms of her house, and she needed to match a paint color to the wallpaper color. She called me over to help! Rebeccah! It is something that people can develop but I definitely feel like it’s also something that has to be inherent to some degree. It’s physical. It’s about the way the cones in your eyes are built. I know that I am in the very small percentage of people who process color in high detail. Another anecdote: Pantone can come to your office and test the color sensitivity of all the designers. When I was design director at Champion, we had the entire design staff tested for color so that we would know who could approve the lab dips. I only got one wrong and that’s because I did the entire test that was supposed to be done in 20 minutes in 5, because I was too busy and I didn’t have time.

I think that applying color to a product is risky, and if you aren’t confident in your ability to choose colors that speak to multiple people and address a cultural context in the right way, it’s harder for you to be an advocate for that risk. In general, people think color is risky. The number one thing I hear from people is, I’m so afraid to use a color. Part of that comes from confidence. Yes, I think I was born with the ability to process color at a high level, but also, I think I learned how to apply color with confidence. That is something you can learn whether you feel like you’re good at color or not. You can learn to feel good about using color. You can learn to be confident in your color choices.

It can be hard for people to overcome fears around color, and that can create a bias against specific colors. There are some particular colors that I really don’t like very much, but then I always seem to find a way to use them. Invariably I can find a context in which I actually would kind of like that color. I don’t really like blue cheese…but there have been times when blue cheese tasted pretty good.

Q: How do you think about balancing time-tested or trusted colors with new, trending colors?

A: Think of it like a layer cake. Your foundation always has to be in these classic colors. No one feels at risk with black, white, gray, and navy. And maybe, if you’re talking about clothing, some sort of neutral color. Think of that as the base of the layer cake. Then the next step up is the colors that you would pair with those colors (other than each other and navy or white). What would be something else that you could pair with one of those colors? That would make the palette feel still accessible but not too risky. And then, what are the right pops of color that you want to add to that palette? The pops don’t have to necessarily be literally bright colors but they could be, or they could be interesting or unusual in some other way. The pop color is not a color that’s going to last for 10 years in the marketplace, but maybe it’s a color that will last a year or a year and a half in the marketplace. You layer these on top.

So you have this layer of the foundation colors, then you have a mid layer that’s going to be core colors that you can see lasting in a product for three to five years, and then you have the pops that will last one to two years. Then you think about how you are going to mix them in a way that will create a sense of comfort. Let’s say the navy gives the comfort of having something neutral, and you add an interesting secondary color that is still understandable while making that navy look a little fresher. Then you add the pop of something really unusual so that you can stand out in the marketplace.

I use this approach regardless of the product category. Most of the products that I’ve designed in my career are consumer products, so I tend to think of the end consumer using it, and then some of the products that we design are B2B. But even if they’re B2B and they’re wearables, then a person is eventually wearing it, so still it’s ending up with the consumer. Across product categories it’s a way to keep freshness in the product without it feeling like just another basic thing. You want the product to be able to stand out but you also want to give people this comfort level so that they don’t feel like they’re going to stand out. Not everybody, of course, because there are bold types and crazy influencers on Instagram that like to be photographed with their orange hair and their green sunglasses. But the majority of consumers don’t want to stand out to the point where people are staring at them. What they want is for people to almost do a double take and say, That looks kind of nice. Wow. You’ve got something new on. So the idea is to create interest that creates newness without alienating people.

Q: What advice do you have for designers looking to improve their color skills?

A: The advice that I would give people who are trying to figure out how they can expand their use of color is for them to just start. They should make notations to themselves about the things that they’re attracted to. I personally love to look at fine art because fine artists never think about color any other way than in abstraction. It’s another element to create their composition, whether it’s a sculpture or a painting. It’s there for a purpose, not to create a product. I look at the pieces of fine art that really speak to me and I think about the super unusual color combinations they feature and how I react to them. I take a thousand million photographs that have to do with color and how it’s used. I suggest that people look at a lot of things and take a lot of pictures to look back on what really spoke to them. Then, once they have a series of photos, they can see, Look, I went to the Whitney and I photographed 20 things. Of those 20 things, nine had this pink in them. Then they can start looking around, seeing where else they observe that pink.Or green, or blue, or whatever it is. Once you have an observation like this about yourself, you’ll start to wonder if you can use that color that is interesting to you in some way, and then you can start building a color palette around it.

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A Q&A with Apparel Entrepreneur Scott London

Spotlight articles shine a light on designers and design materials we admire. Our founder and principal designer Rebeccah Pailes-Friedman has met many wonderful designers as an educator and career designer, and in our Spotlight interviews we ask them about their work and their design journey. In this interview we spoke with entrepreneur and angel investor Scott London. We were especially excited for this Q&A, as Interwoven just helped Scott launch is new padelwear brand, GLDN PNT, and seeing a product launch on the market is always special for us.

Scott London is a seasoned entrepreneur and angel investor with a remarkable career spanning over three decades. London has founded several iconic apparel brands, including Aspen Apparel, Wu-Wear, Zoo York, and Baby Phat, demonstrating his expertise in fashion and brand development. He was an active member of NY Angels, where he was instrumental in mentoring and funding early-stage companies. He is the founder of Metarama Gaming + Music Festival and has made significant contributions to the esports industry through investments in ventures such as Las Vegas Rogue, Millennial Esports, and Enthusiast Gaming. Currently, he serves as the CEO of the newly launched GLDN PNT. His experiences and entrepreneurial spirit make him a great person to talk to about the intersection of design and entrepreneurship. We asked him about the inspiration behind his new brand, what’s special about the sport of padel, how to foster a culture of creativity, and what it was like to work with a design consultancy.

Apparel entrepreneur Scott London — *Photo courtesy of Scott London.*

Q: You’ve created a number of companies. What first drew you to entrepreneurship?

A: I don’t know if there’s a real answer to that other than that it was a natural, organic thing. I started out of school just trying to make money. I hadn’t thought about getting a job. I hadn’t thought about being a professional. I didn’t plan to become an architect or a doctor or whatever. I was an art dealer because I was an art collector and I was friendly with some artists that happened to become very well known. One of my parents’ friends asked me if I could get them a painting from an artist I knew. That morphed into making some T-shirts. I started working for a friend, making T-shirts, and then started my own little T-shirt business. I manufactured for bars and restaurants and things like that. I ended up getting one big account, I remember it was Eddie Bauer. From there I built a private label knit business. So the answer is that nothing was planned.

Q: You recently launched your newest brand, GLDN PNT, what inspired you to start this collection?

A: I play a lot of padel. I moved down to Miami about seven years ago, after selling my last business, and I took up padel. I played a lot of tennis and then was introduced to padel. Padel is super big in Latin America and in Europe, and it’s a real melting pot, especially in Miami. I always thought that if I was going to go back into the clothing business, it would have to be activewear. Everybody’s wearing activewear these days, whether you’re dropping a kid off at school or you’re going to the local coffee shop. You’re no longer dressed up, you’re in your activewear clothes. I thought there was a need for it.

Q: This isn’t your first apparel brand. What makes this brand different?

A: This became a more personal project for me, a more personal company design-wise than any I’ve done before. I used to manufacture for a company called FUBU, which stands for For Us By Us. And GLDN PNT is sort of my FUBU in the sense that it is something that I’m manufacturing for myself. I’ve always loved what Rick Rubin says about his taste in music and why he’s a successful producer. He says that he doesn’t know anything about music. He produces for himself and, luckily, people like that. This time, I’m taking that approach. I know what kind of shorts I’d like to have. I know what kind of t-shirt I’d like to wear. I don’t have to be everything to everybody. It’s a small capsule and I can design what I know I like and what I know my friends in the community like. We’d like to say that this is by padel for padel.

Q: How do you approach brand storytelling generally?

A: There aren’t a lot of padel brands. A Wilson or an Adidas – they are trying to be everything to everybody in a way. They have a tennis line that they say is also for padel. So this is padelwear specifically for padel athletes. And I’m going to get to what I think that means. But the first thing in creating this brand was asking: what is the soul of the brand? A partner and a friend of mine, who was the first person I spoke to about this, was José Moya. I started doubting myself and thinking, is this gonna be just a crazy idea? Is there really a need for this? Am I just gonna be making a bunch of clothes and giving them away to friends? We started talking about golden point and what it means. In padel, golden point is a term in lieu of deuce. When you get to the juncture of deuce, to move the game along, you sometimes play golden point, which means sudden death. Next point wins. And we thought, that’s actually really interesting. That means, make the next moment count. He said, That could work for anything. That could work for running, that could work for any sport. It’s like our version of just do it. That’s the essence of the brand right there. That’s what we’re building: it’s performance apparel for the moments that count, on and off the court. That’s our true north.

Q: Can you tell us about a key piece in the GLDN PNT collection?

A: There’s a couple. I love our cotton and lyocell graphic tee. It’s a performance T-shirt. You can wear it to play. You can wear it to the gym. You can wear it to get an avocado toast. It’s a really comfortable, great feeling T-shirt. And it’s logo-driven but it’s not in your face. In my past life there were a lot of big logos. Now it’s more tonal, so it looks like a nice shirt and you can wear it on the court and it’s great to play in. A great piece for men and women is the short. We can’t be an Alo or a Lululemon, where everybody can find something in the collection. I want people to say they have to have the GLDN PNT short – that’s a great short. At 7 inches it’s a great inseam length and everybody can wear it. It’s a great fitting short with water resistant pockets, so the balls don’t get wet when people sweat. Then there’s a skirt called the flirty skirt, with two ways to store the ball and a sexy logo hit on the bike-style shorts underneath the skirt. I think those three products are the core of our brand right now.

Q: How do you find your customers and how do you work with them to create a GLDN PNT?

A: One of the great things about padel is that it’s a real community. There’s something about padel. I could talk about padel forever in terms of why it’s so addictive, but I think that there are a few big reasons. One: you’re playing in a box. You’re playing with four walls for the most part. It’s something that four people are doing together. In tennis doubles, you’re not necessarily even talking to your partner so much, let alone the people you are playing against. In padel, you’re talking to your opponents as much as you’re talking to your partner. It’s like golf in that sense, it’s very social. That bleeds out into the greater community. There’s a real sense of community in padel. You get everybody’s feedback. I joke around that I have a padel wife. I don’t even know where she lives, I just know her on the courts when we’re playing. I see my son’s friend’s parents. You can hear from the players what they want and what they need. I can see what they’re wearing day in and day out.

Q: How much do you pay attention to current trends when making decisions about a collection?

A: I was paying attention to attitude more than trends. I told a friend of mine that I was playing with that I was doing this collection and he said, That’s great, because there’s nothing to wear. I was surprised by that. There’s a world of tennis clothes out there. It’s not actually anything different, right? It made me think about what he meant. I think it’s similar to the early days of snowboarding and skiing. Now it’s a whole category but, in the early days, the snowboarder didn’t want to wear the ski clothes. They could have, technically. There were some things that had to be adjusted with the pants but they could have worn ski clothes and they could still wear ski clothes today. But athletes want to differentiate themselves, because a sport is a community.

Q: You worked with Interwoven to create this collection. Could you talk about some of the challenges and rewards of working with a design consultancy?

A: When I owned a private label knit business, I worked with other people’s designers and just did the manufacturing for them. Then, when I had my own brands, we had in-house designers. That’s how I got to know Rebeccah. We knew each other from a past life. She was working at Fila at the time, and I was manufacturing. Years later, I reached out to work with her on GLDN PNT.

As a startup, it was so great to work with Interwoven. It’s great to outsource design skills. You’re watching every penny and you can’t necessarily have an in-house designer. You probably don’t even know who you are yet as a brand to invest in an in-house designer. So you can go to somebody that you’ve worked with in the past and, potentially, as in the case with Rebeccah and her team, you know you speak the same language, and you can hit the ground running. That’s the pro. The con is that I wanted a hundred percent of Rebeccah’s time, but that’s not how it works. It was a great balance for us as a new brand and a great fit for the project.

Q: How do you foster a culture of creativity and innovation within your team?

A: I think you just have to keep an open mind about everything. It’s the same for every business, I imagine. You can’t bash bad ideas. You can’t have people afraid to come up with ideas because the diamonds are in the rough. The good idea is somewhere, it’s going to reveal itself if you let it. If people are afraid to present ideas, a great idea is not going to come out. Having open communication, open dialogue – it gets everybody flowing. You make sure everybody’s comfortable, make sure everybody’s collaborating, make sure everybody respects everybody.

I really like what James [Jebbia] did at Supreme. I like what Ronnie [Fieg] does at Kith. These are big shoes to fill but I like how they stuck to their core in terms of building the brands. They stuck to having capsules and drops and things like that versus trying to be everything to everybody. Supreme is a mature brand at this point but it still has an incredible soul. They were always true to that skateboard brand, even as they expanded into fashion, and I would love to be core like that to padel, and then be able to branch out from there and make the next moment count. I previously owned a brand called Zoo York. Downtown New York was a different thing than it is today, but the kids were wearing the product and skating up and down the streets, and it was the same with Supreme. It was being worn by the kid that was skating. Right now I’m focusing on stuff that’s primarily being worn on the court.

Q: How has your approach to creating new ventures evolved over the years?

A: It’s a lot scarier now. Now I know too much. When you’re young, you don’t know what’s ahead of you. You don’t know how hard it is. You kind of stumble along. I felt like I knew so much. I knew I needed to get the right pick and pack, I knew I needed the right designer, the right production person, and all these things are costly. There’s a very low barrier to entry, but there’s a big barrier to scale. Now all of a sudden I’ve created this brand, I’ve created this product, we have product in the warehouse, and now I actually have to get it to scale. I actually have to get it out there in the world.

Q: What advice would you give someone who is thinking of starting their own apparel brand?

A: Just do it. It’s a lot of fun. if they’re passionate about it, if it’s something that they know and love that they’re designing for themselves, they should do it. I had a partner at Baby Phat and we would look at deliveries. Every single month, we had a new delivery. It was a lot of product, 30 or 40 new styles a month, and we would guess which one would do the best. The one we guessed was always the one that did the worst, because it wasn’t designed for us. We weren’t the customer. I think if you’re designing for yourself and you’re designing for your friends and your community, you can be more passionate about it.

I think It’s a hundred million little things, because there are so many different aspects of the clothing business. It’s multifaceted, especially in a startup where I’m wearing the CEO hat, the CFO hat, working with the head of design and production…you’re making a lot of different decisions that all have to coordinate. I think of the people I’ve worked with in the past and try to think how they would do things. I try to bring lots of those little pieces to the table and make sure that the ship stays upright so we can get to the next level.

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Crafting Comfort: Exploring the Footwear Design Process

The footwear design industry stands out for its blend of creativity and technical precision. Unlike many other design fields, it requires a deep understanding of both aesthetic appeal and functional considerations. Footwear designers are up against unique challenges, needing to meet ergonomic and visual needs while creating a product with a notoriously hard (and, consequently, often short) life ahead. As consumers, we want shoes that look great, speak to our personal style, serve our needs, and feel comfortable. Ideally, we want shoes that do all of this regardless of the category or use case, and we’ve all encountered shoes that don’t quite hit the mark. In this Insight article we will share some key considerations of footwear design and outline the footwear design process from concept to creation.

Top view of shoemaker making shoe on the table in workshop. — A designer adds design details to a footwear prototype. Photo via iStock.

Key Considerations in Footwear Design

Footwear design encompasses various essential factors that merge both artistic and technical elements. Like clothing design, it involves shaping, texturing, coloring, and balancing proportions. However, it also delves into intricate engineering aspects. Here’s a breakdown of the key components of good footwear design:

Functionality and Comfort: Achieving the right balance between function and comfort is paramount. This involves tailoring the design to suit different occasions—be it formal, casual, or athletic wear—while ensuring ergonomic support and wearability.
Fit and Anatomy: Central to footwear design is considering diverse foot sizes, shapes, arch support needs, and biomechanics. Utilizing tools like 3D molds helps designers to craft designs that accommodate varied anatomical features and movement patterns.
Material Selection: Choosing suitable materials for different parts of the shoe is crucial for both aesthetics and durability. This includes decisions regarding the lining, insole, outsole, padding, and upper portions, with options ranging from leather and fabric to mesh and suede. The material selection also plays a large part in the sustainability of a footwear design.
Construction Techniques: Determining the appropriate construction methods—such as stitching, bonding, and molding—is vital for ensuring structural integrity and longevity based on the design’s requirements. As the construction techniques available are constantly evolving as new technologies are developed, this is an exciting area for innovation in footwear design.
Aesthetic Appeal and Style: Crafting visually appealing designs that resonate with fashion trends and brand identity is a core aspect of footwear design. This involves conceptualizing and refining sketches, prototypes, and design elements such as color, texture, shape, and detailing.
Ethical and Sustainable Practices: With increasing emphasis on environmental consciousness, integrating ethical and sustainable practices into footwear design is critical. This includes using eco-friendly and recycled materials, adhering to ethical labor and manufacturing standards, and exploring cruelty-free options like vegan materials.

The Footwear Design Process

Designing footwear is a multifaceted process that merges creativity with technical expertise. A team of specialists come together to bring the concept to life. Drawing from the insights of seasoned designers, let’s explore the journey of a shoe design from concept to creation.

A designer marks a last. Photo via iStock.

Step 1. Inspiration and Research: Before diving into the design process, it’s crucial to draw inspiration from various sources and conduct thorough research. Whether it’s personal experiences, emerging materials, or market trends, this stage sets the foundation for unique and innovative designs. We like to look for inspiration on Pinterest, Instagram, and Directive Collective. As shoes are tightly aligned with fashion, we also review WGSN for trends and forecasting in fashion, determining the desired launch date for the shoe and confirming the most promising trend directions for our project. It is also common to review trends in car design to inform footwear.

Step 2. Conceptualization and Definition: Once inspired, designers define the concept that will guide the entire design process. This concept serves as a reference point for every aspect of the footwear collection, ensuring a cohesive aesthetic and mood. This typically involves narrowing down the major category of footwear. On the spectrum of lifestyle to performance, where does it land? Is it for men, women, children, or is it unisex? Does it target a niche user, like being designed for a specific sport? All of these questions help to determine the purpose of the shoe and where it will be situated in the market.

Step 3. Style and Selection: With the concept in place, designers identify the style and characteristics of the footwear, considering factors such as form, design details, and production techniques. Selections are made regarding shoe shapes, materials, and design elements to align with the defined concept. This part of the process likely involves narrowing down the potential directions discovered in the trends and forecasting research. While there are a broad range of style and color trends active at any moment, choosing a specific palette and style direction helps to keep a design or collection cohesive. Often this step involves creating a mood board that will unite the design team in the vision for the design.

Step 4. Design Development: Building upon the chosen style, designers translate conceptual ideas into tangible designs. Sketches and technical drawings are created to visualize every detail of the shoe, ensuring consistency and coherence within the collection. We generate an abundance of ideas and edit them to identify the concepts that most closely align with the goals outlined in steps 2 and 3.

Step 5. Pattern Making and Cutting: Highly skilled artisans meticulously create patterns based on design drawings, taking into account factors like material properties and measurements. Patterns are then cut from selected materials, with attention to detail to optimize material usage and quality. A last – a mechanical form shaped like a human foot – is finalized. This is the template of the foot that will be used for the design going forward, and the quality of the last used will make or break the success of the shoe.

Step 6. Assembly and Prototyping: Pattern pieces are assembled by skilled craftsmen, stitching them together to form the full upper of the shoe. This assembled upper is combined with components like toe and heel stiffeners, insoles, and outsoles to create the prototype shoe.

Step 7. Prototype Assessment and Adjustment: The prototype undergoes thorough assessment by designers and artisans to evaluate its visual and technical aspects. Adjustments are made as necessary to ensure the prototype aligns with the original concept and meets quality standards. Variations might be created to finalize decisions around design details and test color combinations.

Step 8. Iterative Refinement: If adjustments are required (and they often are), the prototype is remade to incorporate agreed-upon changes. This iterative refinement process continues until the shoe meets expectations in terms of aesthetics, comfort, and functionality.

Step 9. Finalization and Production: Once the prototype is approved, the shoe is ready for mass production. Patterns are scaled for each required size, ensuring consistency across the range. With the technicalities ironed out and designs finalized, the shoes are ready to be brought to market.

Step 10. Brand Identity and Storytelling: Throughout the design process, a strong concept and cohesive vision contribute to the development of a brand identity. The relationship between designer and artisan, as well as the technical expertise applied, imbues the final product with stories and conversations that resonate with consumers. While the concept defining in steps 2 and 3 is powerful for a consistent internal understanding of the design, the storytelling step is about translating that vision for the consumer.

Footwear designers must navigate a complex process that involves concept development, material selection, prototyping, and production, all while keeping abreast of market trends and technological advancements. The industry’s focus on sustainability and ethical practices is increasingly becoming a defining feature, influencing everything from material choices to production methods. Overall, the footwear design industry is characterized by its innovative spirit, attention to detail, and the ability to merge artistry with practicality to create products that not only look good but also perform well. The footwear design process involves a blend of creativity, research, technical skill, and iterative refinement. From initial inspiration to final production, designers navigate a complex journey to bring their vision to life, creating shoes that not only look beautiful but also tell compelling stories to those who wear them.

Design History Series N. 016

Beth Levine and American Footwear

In our Design History Series we highlight iconic women in design history and their innovative work. The historic contributions of women to design are many, and we aim to increase the awareness of these contributions in order to counteract a general trend of underrepresentation. In this issue we celebrate Beth Levine, the most influential and innovative American shoe designer of the twentieth century.

Tiny Feet, Big Dreams

Beth Levine, dubbed “America’s First Lady of Shoe Design,” left an indelible mark on the world of footwear that continues to influence contemporary fashion. Born in Patchogue, New York, in 1914, Levine soon left Long Island for a shoe modeling career in New York City. She had incredibly tiny feet (US size 4, EU size 35) that were the sample size of the era, and developed a keen intuition for how shoes would fit. At the time, shoe designers were men, usually those descended from generations of cobblers. Levine realized that she understood just as much about what constituted a good shoe as these prominent designers, if not more, and was determined to design shoes herself.

Creating the Brand

In 1946, while applying to work at a shoe manufacturer, she met and married Herbert Levine, then a fashion executive. The two founded their shoe factory, Herbert Levine, Inc. in 1948 and Beth began making shoes under Herbert’s name. At the time, footwear had not yet been sold with a woman’s name on the product. The factory was known for its excellence, and talent was brought to New York from all over the world to ensure top quality. She was known for relishing the challenges of footwear, saying “Clothes designers have gravity on their side, but shoe designers work upside down. Ideas are easy to come by. Getting them realized is something else.”

The couple had a vision to create shoes that were not just functional but also captivating. Using strategic cutouts and careful material choices, Levine became known for shoes that made women’s feet appear smaller and were therefore perceived as more elegant. Levine is credited with repopularizing the mule silhouette with this approach. At the same time, she wanted her designs to be comfortable above all, and she wasn’t afraid to be playful and bold. Beth’s innovative designs and Herbert’s business sense propelled the brand to prominence, garnering attention from fashion icons like Barbra Streisand and America’s first ladies of the era; Lady Bird Johnson, Patricia Nixon, and Jacqueline Kennedy.

Making History (Again and Again)

One of Beth’s most significant contributions to footwear design was her role in reintroducing boots to women’s fashion in the 1960s. Through her creative vision, boots transformed from utilitarian items into stylish fashion statements. Her stretchy stocking styles and vinyl Go-Go boots captured the spirit of the era and became iconic symbols of liberation and empowerment, epitomized by Nancy Sinatra’s hit song “These Boots Are Made For Walkin’.” The song not only propelled the demand for fashion boots but also led to the establishment of “Beth’s Bootery”, a dedicated fashion boot department at Saks Fifth Avenue.

Beth’s designs were characterized by their whimsical charm and innovative use of materials. On a dare she designed “topless” or “upper-less” heels, shoes with no upper that would be affixed to the foot with adhesive pads. She called another style “Barefoot in the Grass” and lined the insole with AstroTurf. For the wife of a driver in the 1967 Indianapolis 5000, she designed a shoe that resembles (adorably) a race car, which became so popular that variations on the design were released for years afterward. Her creations pushed the boundaries of conventional footwear. She experimented with unconventional materials (hello, AstroTurf) like vinyl, acrylic, and laminate, creating shoes that were not only visually striking but also ahead of their time. She also developed the now universally standard practice of putting an illustration of the shoe on the outside of the shoebox.

An Enduring Legacy

Throughout her career, Beth Levine received numerous accolades for her groundbreaking designs, including the prestigious Coty Award in 1967. Her ability to marry creativity with functionality revolutionized the shoe industry and paved the way for future generations of designers. Despite the closure of the Herbert Levine brand in 1975, Beth’s legacy endures through her iconic designs, many of which are housed in international costume collections. To Levine, who passed away in 2006, the only mistake in design is to “play it safe”. Today, her innovative spirit continues to inspire designers and fashion enthusiasts alike, reminding us of the enduring impact of her contributions to the history of footwear design.

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