What blue means in branding

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In the United States and across Europe, blue is the colour people most often pick as their favourite. Surveys there link it with harmony, confidence, knowledge, intelligence, calmness, distance, the imagination, cold and sadness. Because of its link with harmony it was chosen for the flags of the United Nations and the European Union.

Four palettes from blue

Worked out in OKLCH from the swatch above. Open one to get the light and dark themes, the contrast check and the code.

• Analogous
• Complementary
• Triadic
• Split

History

• Egyptian blue, made in ancient Egypt in the third millennium BC, was the first artificial pigment.
• Lapis lazuli was ground into ultramarine in the Renaissance, the most expensive of all pigments.
• Prussian blue was discovered in 1709. Dark blue later became the colour of military uniforms, then business suits.

Brands known for blue

• IBM

  Nicknamed Big Blue, partly because of its blue logo and colour scheme.

• Tiffany & Co.

  Tiffany Blue has been a registered colour trademark since 1998. Its Pantone number, 1837, is the year the company was founded.

Sources

• Wikipedia: Blue
• Wikipedia: IBM
• Wikipedia: Tiffany Blue

The swatch is my own pick of blue, not an official value.

Other colours

• Redheat, activity, passion, anger, love, joy
• Orangeamusement, warmth, energy, activity, extroversion
• Yellowamusement, gentleness, humour, happiness, spontaneity
• Greennature, life, health, youth, hope
• Purplerarity, royalty, luxury, ambition, mystery
• Pinksweetness, innocence, femininity
• Brownearth, nature, reliability
• Blackelegance, authority, secrets, force
• Whiteperfection, honesty, cleanliness, the new, neutrality