Favorite Memories > College Colors

Submitted by Bob Purser (retired art instructor)

The new campus of Bellevue Community College was opened in 1969. The buildings looked very somber. As seen from north to south, the room modules (36’) had stucco walls that were white while the lower parts of the 10 foot modules were a light brown color. The college did look very stark, as the landscaping was minuscule; beauty bark seemed to cover most of the terrain. Faculty and students complained of the bleak color so the architectural firm NBBJ had their interior designers select a new palette. (Architects usually get no training in color and thus are very insecure on the subject.)

Meanwhile the college had adopted school colors of sky blue and a cherry red. The NBBJ interior designers honored this by suggesting the college be painted to match. The upper part of an exterior stucco wall was bright red on the upper part while the lower wall was a bright blue. Dark blue was used for trim on the narrow section above the other two colors. On the interior court the color scheme was orange and light blue with the same dark blue for doors and trim. The designers gave a presentation to the campus showing the new colors.

While the scheme was quite up-beat I immediately reacted negatively to them. In analyzing my reaction I realized that there was little or no contrast . This was especially true with colors of the interior court. I tried to explain to the designers that they had a value problem--the blue and orange were the same value and to my recollection, about the same value as the concrete and brick. The designers couldn‘t understand my objection and lectured me on the fact that orange and blue are complements and had plenty of contrast. It was done in a condescending manner that I found insulting. I knew exactly what they were talking about as I teach a course on color.

In any case the college administration when along with the architect’s recommendation. I was curious to know if I was correct about the value issue. One day Kae Hutchison had her camera loaded with black and white film. So I asked her to take a picture at a corner where the orange and blue came together and were you could also see the brick and concrete. Her photo showed all colors within one value step of each other. The orange and blue were the same value as I’d surmised. I sent this on to the designers but never heard back from them.

The other problem with the color scheme (for the interior court) was that it was strictly a “systems approach” with all the orange and white running on north and south corridors while blue and white was used east and west. Long corridors of nothing but orange were deadly. Interspersed the blue would at least give the viewer some variety. Somehow word spread that I was responsible for the new scheme and I find many still believe this.

When Jean Floten became president of B.C.C. I took her on a tour or the campus in an attempt to educate her the architectural history of the college. She was quite receptive but clearly disliked the colors. Several years later the campus planner, Don Noble invited me to his office to discuss the colors as a new wing was being built for student services. The architects were reluctant to paint it the bright colors of the 70’s. He made it very clear that Mrs. Floten didn’t like the existing colors. Yet he didn’t have the funds to repaint the whole campus. We agreed that the light blue wasn’t so bad and maybe a substitute for the orange could be found.

A year or so later I had my color theory class work on a campus color scheme. I divided them into teams to select a contrasting color. One team rebelled completely and recommended a mossy green and dark dusty pink. They felt green would blend the architecture to the surroundings. Another chose a pale yellow with the blue. This would obviously be a mistake creating cleaning problems as students often put their shoes against the walls when leaning. The class ended up selecting a rich terra cotta to use with the sky blue. It wasn’t perfect but seemed acceptable. I took this to Don Noble who seemed to like the idea. That was the last I heard about it. Meanwhile Callison Architects painted the Student Services Building the light blue and white with a new trim color, blue-green.

About 1996 Barbara Martin (who had assumed Don Noble’s job) announced that the college would be completely repainted and Callison’s designers were working on new color schemes. At this time I was not on the Design Review Committee but replaced by Carolyn Luark (a design teacher). Also on the committee were Tom Nielsen (Arts and Humanities Chair and registered architect) and Connie Wais (Interior Design Chair). The committee has a number of others from the campus community as well. My information on what happened next is all second hand as I didn’t attend the meetings.
The designers from Callison presented two schemes, one had two shades of brown and the other was a mossy green (Burmese Jade) with ivory (Casablanca). As I understand it the faculty from design areas were less than enthusiastic about either scheme. I felt the brown was completely wrong as it would compete with the reddish brown of the brick. It did have some contrast--a vital characteristic of a monochromatic scheme. The green was handsome but again the same value as the concrete and brick. Never-the-less, areas were painted with both schemes and the whole campus was asked to vote on the one preferred. The green and ivory won.

One faculty member came to discuss the colors with me. He called the green “prosaic green.” I couldn’t find heraldic names for the colors so I send an e-mail to the campus declaring a contest to name the green. We got a number of very “creative entries” including Garbage Day, Gang-green, Day Old Guacamole, Dreary Moss, Seattle in January, Lovechild of Godzilla and Not What We Had In Mind. Affirming included: Guacamole, Oregano, Kelp-lite, Sea Foam, Fog and Silver Sage. As I recall President Floten submitted Dusty Sage. Later Barbara Martin informed me that the green was officially Burmese Jade while the ivory was termed Casablanca. As suspected the green almost matches the gray concrete on a rainy day. A dark green was painted on the railings and other trim but the color of doors was still undecided. The dark blue clearly didn’t go with the new colors.

The next year I was on the Design Review Committee once more. Rob deGrasse (Director of Campus Operations) presented about 10 different door colors ranging from blue-green to a rich plum. Staff and faculty had been asked to view doors painted with each color. They chose a rusty brown. The committee was inclined to go with this but I pointed out that the color is very close to the brick color and people would think we were trying to match it but missed. I was pulling for the plum purple (Called Eggplant). It was a rich color contrasting with the green. The committee voted to adopt this. However one night when I was on campus I observed the purple under the fluorescent lights and it looked awful. It appeared as a gloomy black. I tried to convince the committee to reconsider but it was too late, several more doors had been changed permanently. Well, the “Eggplant” still looks great during daylight hours.

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