Nature's Palette: A Color Reference System from the Natural World

I have had my eye on this book for some time. I am so glad I finally purchased it. I dabble with watercolor and paint nature, mostly botanical. I assumed I would use this for color matching, but I find it is helpful for so much more. The book is useful creating color pallets for most anything. You will open it when selecting a wardrobe, decorating home interior or designing a floral garden. Printed on cold press type art paper the book has many illustrations, nature collections, and dioramas. It is a pleasure to browse. It stimulates creativity and gets those ideas flowing. This book is indispensable in a nature artist's morgue.

When I viewed the "Look Inside" feature for this book, I knew I would love it. But the actual volume FAR exceeded expectations. The production value of the book is special, beginning with a cover with embossed touches and stately metallic typography. Various fold-outs appear throughout the book, featuring images of appropriately-colored marbleized papers.......perfect grace notes to illustrate the color-themed charts. This book performs well on many levels -- there is ample text, if you want to explore the academic aspect of color and nature.......but if, like me, you want to be inspired by visual references, this book is a bonanza. Archival images abound. Think: minerals, shells, bird eggs, anatomical charts, maps, drawers-full of collected artifacts, glass domes and taxidermy birds, etc. All with color annotations, and swatches. This book takes a "micro" look at color -- and provides a "macro" amount of information and visual enjoyment. A cabinet of curiosities -- and delights! -- for the artist and reader.

Lovely book! As an art teacher, I appreciate this very much!

If you're an artist or crafter whose techniques are solid but whose color theory is a little underdeveloped or all over the map, this is the book for you. Each section shows colors as they appear in nature, in animal, mineral and plant forms, so combining the same colors shown in the illustrations of those things can't help but create a harmonious and natural-looking scheme. Whether you want to know what color to paint a thing to get a natural result, or what colors of yarn to combine for an aesthetically pleasing sweater, this book has you covered. As a scientific reference it's also pretty interesting. Rock hounds, bird watchers and plant lovers can find lots to explore here. I love this book so much and found it so useful as a reference, I sent one to my quilter mother as a gift.

There is no question that this is an exquisite volume, lovely to look through and study. I think.it fills an important niche in the history of natural color palettes. I was disappointed, however, that It seemed of little practical use for me as a botanical illustrator. While there are many bird illustrations and pages of insects and bird’s eggs, there is relatively scant attention given to plants and flowers. The suggestions of color mixes tend to be rather repetitive and not especially relevant for the watercolorist. There is a chart which converts the named color combinations to Winsor and Newton watercolor names. I found this of some interest. For me, the book proves more inspirational than reference.

A wonderful book dedicated to displaying colors in nature. A feast for the eyes.

Those who love nature and have an appreciation for color and design will be in heaven. I loved the illustrations and color charts which became the inspiration for a home makeover. It is especially helpful that the authors list the Pantone and CMYK numbers in the back.

This is such a great gift for artists, Nature lovers, anyone. It’s absurdly gorgeous and am buying another for someone this year.

This book is the best book I have ever seen with relation to colour, colour theory, how colour connects with nature, natural history, zoology, insects, rocks/stones/minerals and a must have for people interested in art and colour. This book is like an encyclopaedia. It’s so beautifully made, and the presentation is exceptionally stunning!! This book covers the origins, development and influence of Werner’s Nomenclature of colour. In the top corner of each page there is a colour and the pictures relate to the colour. The layout is so stunning, exceptional well laid out. It has pull out sections. There has been no expense spared with this book. This book would make an incredible gift for an artist as it’s a book you would treasure for life, but also use as a reference guide tool when needing to refer to colour. I think this book should be in every school/university/library because it’s so comprehensive and so incredible and inspiring.

This book is GORGEOUS. Worth every penny!

Nature's Palette é uma obra de arte. É um livro muito bem produzido em todos os sentidos, desde pesquisa e conteúdo até edição e diagramação. As imagens e impressões são de excelente qualidade. O papel é espesso e matte, evitando o reflexo da luz que pode deturpar as cores e também o "sangramento" da cor na página seguinte. Hoje em dia, na era de maximizar lucros e diminuir custos, são raros os produtos que parecem "valer o dinheiro"; esse livro é um deles; pode parecer caro, mas isso porque gastos não foram poupados na sua produção. Esse é um livro feito com muito cuidado e dedicação e você sente isso em cada página. O livro é baseado no sistema de catalogação de cores de Patrick Syme na segunda edição de "Nomenclatura de Cores de Werner" (1821). São 110 cores no total, organizadas em 10 grupos (brancos, cinzas, pretos, azuis, roxos, verdes, amarelo, laranja, vermelho e marrons) e em 13 placas de cor originais. O revolucionário no sistema de Syme foi a associação de cada cor à um animal, vegetal e mineral, eliminando, assim, as possíveis discrepâncias na percepção das cores descritas. Na época, a técnica de impressão disponível ainda não possuía cores e elas precisavam ser pintadas à mão; havia grande variação no resultado, mesmo que não intencional. Ao oferecer exemplos no mundo real, esse problema era evitado. Cada seção do livro é composta, nessa ordem, por: - página-título; - reprodução da placa de cor original respectiva à cor da seção (algumas seções possuem folhas dobráveis e muito bonitas); - uma tabela com a amostra da cor, o número e nome atribuído por Syme, o nome e uma pequena imagem do animal, vegetal e mineral que Syme usa como exemplo; - uma página individual para cada cor da tabela com as ilustrações maiores e a descrição da composição da cor; - por fim, um artigo discutindo a história dos sistemas de Werner e Syme ou a aplicação deles na zoologia, botânica e medicina. Há uma abundância de imagens de referência que acompanham os artigos e, quando possível, as cores das imagens são catalogadas usando o sistema de Syme. Essa é uma informação especialmente útil, pois as cores originais das placas perderam saturação nos 200 anos desde que foram criadas, então as fotografias com as cores sinalizadas nos dá uma impressão mais autêntica da intenção original. No final do livro, há uma tabela que associa cada cor de Syme com um código CMYK ou Pantene, assim como empresas conhecidas que produzem tintas para artistas e empresas que produzem tintas para decoração.

Il libro è più interessante come documento storico dell'illustrazione naturalistica, che non per uso di artisti moderni.

I am thrilled with the book! The illustrations are beautiful and also very practical for judging the colours in combination. I was especially surprised by the reference table for printers and artists on the last page, it's awesome! Everything has been transferred to CMYK and the effort has been made to find out which WINSOR & NEWTON colour is the matching equivalent!