LSN : News : Foresight Friday: Simar Deol, foresight analyst

Sherwin-Williams launches The Loneliest Colour paint campaign

The Loneliest Color by Sherwin-Williams, Global

US – For the last 14 years, Sherwin-Williams has celebrated a Colour of the Year. In 2024, the paint brand is taking a different tack, launching The Loneliest Colour campaign instead.

Kingdom Gold SW 6698 is a luminous golden-yellow colour with green undertones and high saturation. It is also the brand’s least popular and therefore ‘loneliest’ colour.

Sherwin-Williams has teamed up with fashion icon and author Dapper Dan on the campaign, a design visionary who reflects the project’s core values through his dedication to individuality, personality and creativity.

The project will be brought to life through eight one-of-a-kind pieces of wearable art in the Kingdom Gold colour. They will be auctioned on eBay, with the proceeds donated to Habitat for Humanity and affiliate organisations in Dapper Dan's hometown of Harlem.

From Ikea’s Life is not a Catalogue campaign to Sherwin-Williams’ Loneliest Colour, it seems the interior design sector is taking a page out of beauty’s book and leaning into Anti-aspirational Aesthetics.

Strategic opportunity

Embrace anti-aspirational and authentic branding and campaign concepts to combat consumer fatigue with overly polished visuals to stand out amid market saturation

Peachy Den unveils heirloom collection celebrating female craftsmanship

Heirloom Collection by Peachy Den, Global

UK – British fashion brand Peachy Den has unveiled the Peachy Preserve Series 1 Heirloom, a collection that pays homage to female craftsmanship through the revival of vintage handmade doilies. Once symbols of prestige and taste, these intricately stitched pieces have been upcycled with deconstructed men's shirts, breathing new life into forgotten domestic art.

Inspired by artist Rose English's exploration of women's work, Isabella Weatherby, Peachy Den's founder and creative director, said she wanted to dive deep into overlooked craftsmanship. The collection, meticulously crafted in Peachy Den's London atelier, bears the names of elderly relatives from the team, honouring their legacy. 'I’ve been looking at a lot of what my grandmother wore when I was growing up,' Weatherby told WWD. 'There was a lot of polka dots!'

Available exclusively at Peachy Den's Shoreditch pop-up, the collection features 12 garments priced between £80 ($101, €94) and £125 ($157, €146). The pop-up will also showcase works from other London-based female-owned brands, fostering a sense of community within the industry.

In Cultured Waste, we analyse how, as consumers tire of separating authentic sustainability claims from greenwashing, designers are using culture and heritage to cut through the noise.

Strategic opportunity

Craft narratives around your products that evoke nostalgia or celebrate craftsmanship. Highlighting the stories behind your products can deepen customer engagement and create emotional connections

Foresight Friday: Simar Deol, foresight analyst

Every Friday, we offer an end-of-week wrap-up of the topics, issues, ideas and virals we’re all talking about. This week, foresight analyst Simar Deol dives into the joylessness of dating apps, the WNBA’s unique brand partnership and the Muslim Met Gala.

: TikTok is abound with users discussing their newfound BoySobriety and the challenges of dating in today’s digital realms. Dating horror stories aside, The Atlantic’s Lorna Kelley reveals how dating apps’ introduction of subscriptions and paid features are what is making these apps less enjoyable to use. This is especially true for younger audiences who got used to swiping for free and enjoyed the more playful side of digital love, as revealed in Video Dating Futures.

: Women might be ditching dating for now, but they’re showing up to support women’s sports teams. Last weekend’s NCAA basketball finals brought in 4.1m more viewers than the men's game. This could explain the number of partnerships the WNBA is closing, including its most recent branded collaboration with Opill, an over-the-counter birth control. WNBA players have been vocal about their struggles with birth control and the possible reality of being Women Without Kids.

: For some, the Met Gala represents the apex of high-fashion. Among the Muslim community of New York City, there is a different event that allows them the opportunity to express their identities through style – morning prayers for Eid al-Fitr. Beautifully captured for The New York Times, the city’s Muslim community gathered in Washington Square Park in a range of attires, paying homage to the multiplicity of their heritage and religion.

Quote of the week

'Paying for a dating-app subscription can feel like entering a lottery: exciting but potentially a waste of money (with an added dose of worry that you look desperate)'

Lora Kelley, associate editor, The Atlantic

Stat: British children want better access to nature and green space

Faces of Travel by Delta Air Lines and Adobe, US

UK – A study from conservation charity The National Trust and children’s newspaper First News has revealed that 76% of children want to spend more time in nature, but nearly two-thirds (63%) of parents only take them once a week or less, citing accessibility as the main barrier.

Surveying 1,000 children aged seven to 14 and 1,000 parents in the UK, the report also identified that 31% of parents from lower-income households say the main barrier to accessing nature is cost and that more than half of children (56%) want better access to nature and green spaces.

In the leisure section of our Generation Alpha: From the Sandbox to Roblox macrotrend report, we dispelled the notion that Alphas are solely interested in digital experiences and showed that they have an appetite for outdoor play and in-person socialisation. Innovative AI Edu-play-tion brands are consequently tapping into technologies that augment the outdoors, appealing to the duality of Gen Alpha’s online-offline needs.

Strategic opportunity

How can your brand make outdoor spaces more accessible? Consider subsidising activities through vouchers included with your products or by sponsoring events in community green spaces such as parks or urban farms