Main image courtesy Pantone.

Well, it’s finally here. Not only does December bring big sales and Spotify wrapped, it’s also when Pantone releases its Color of the Year – the color that will define the upcoming twelve months.

This year? Pantone selected a “gentle” color in contrast to last year’s vibrant magenta.

Pantone 13-1023 aka Peach Fuzz is getting a lot of buzz. Also known as hex code #FFBE98 or RGB 255 190 152, people are all wondering the same thing: how was Peach Fuzz chosen? And how can marketers, creatives, and shoppers leverage in the year to come?

Whether you’ve gone down the rabbit hole of the correlations between Pantone’s Color of the Year and the companies that pay the most for Pantone licensing or you’re a firm believer that the COTY is chosen strictly on vibes, there’s no denying that it will play a huge role in product and design trends in the upcoming year.

That’s why today we’re doing a deep dive into Pantone 13-1023:

• Get to know Peach Fuzz’s backstory
• How companies + Pantone partners are leveraging the shade
• Color palettes to help you find places for Peach Fuzz in your own designs

🍑 How Peach Fuzz Came to Power

Get to Know Pantone’s Gentle and Velvety Color of 2024

Choosing the color of the year is a big deal – so how did Pantone land on Peach Fuzz for 2024? In a statement on the Pantone website, Executive Director of the Pantone Institute Leatrice Eiseman revealed:

“In seeking a hue that echoes our innate yearning for closeness and connection, we chose a color radiant with warmth and modern elegance. A shade that resonates with compassion, offers a tactile embrace, and effortlessly bridges the youthful with the timeless.”

Reflecting the earthy tones that have trending in the worlds of fashion and design as well as a warm cheerfulness that is a reminder that joy still shines in a difficult world, Peach Fuzz is the Perfect color to saturate 2024.

🍑 Peach Fuzz Products You Can Pick Up in 2024

Meet the Brands Already on the Peach Fuzz Bandwagon

Each year, Pantone partners with countless brands to release products in the shade of their color of the year. This year, collaborations include:

Motorola

Peach Fuzz sparks joy – much like staying connected with loved ones. Motorlla’s sleek new cell phones in the signature color highlight the importance of shared moments… and look darn good, too.

Cariuma

Sustainable fashion is the next big trend, and ethical shoe label Cariuma hit the ground running, so to speak, with these stylish Peach Fuzz sneakers. For every pair purchase, Caiuma plants a pair of trees in the Brazilian rainforest. The fact that they’ve put 2 million roots in the earth (and counting) should be an indication of how much people love the concept!

Ultrafabrics

Much like the comforting coziness of Pantone 13-1023, Ultrafabrics textile offerings evoke feelings of warmth and security. This year, Ultrafabrics is amplifying the point by creating The Nest – a visual narrative that reimagines our spaces as inspiring and optimistic with global interactive events on how the Color of the Year can be incorporated to diverse environments.

🍑 Peachy Keen Art

Peach Fuzz Been a Part of the Visual Landscape for a Long Time

While it has flown under the radar for a while, the warm, peachy color of Peach Fuzz has been an integral part of visual art for centuries. From religious art of the Early Rennaissance to modern cubist portraits, we’re exploring some of the most striking examples of Pantone 13-1023 in Google’s Art Palette database.

While the creator of this Buddhist figure and the precise date this Chinese sculpture was formed are unknown, the peachy stone creates a feeling of warmth, comfort, and serenity. With a gentle color like Peach Fuzz, it’s no surprise to find it mixed in with religious artifacts dating back possibly thousands of years.

The bright hues in this 1923 painting by Greek artist Spiros Papluca are brilliant, almost appearing to glow. Such a vibrant color palette not only complements the coziness of Peach Fuzz, but the verdant bushes and cool shadows are offset by a large swath of Peach Fuzz in the sun soaked background.

Complementary colors, blue and orange are often used together to create impactful visual designs. This abstract painting by Joseph Stella in the early 1920s brings to mind not only the striking blue tiles all but synonymous with the Italian artist’s homeland in the Mediterranean, but also the ornate stained glass and art deco architecture that pervaded the artist’s home of Astoria, New York during this time period.

Created in the 17th century by an unknown German artist, Madonna of the Henleberg is a woodcut print on laid paper that has survived nearly 400 years. The color chosen for the print? A soft orange, like Peach Fuzz.

Peach Fuzz even appears in highly realistic Renaissance paintings like this one. Notice how it shines through on the bridge of the man’s nose, on his chest, even in the highlights of where the light hits his fingers.

Pantone’s Color of the Year isn’t just relegated to masterworks of the past. Released in December 2023 just before Pantone’s 2024 Color of the Year was released, even Nicki Minaj’s highly anticipated Pink Friday 2 album has a splash of peachy pink. It’s just another indication that Peach Fuzz, relevant in fashion and culture past and present, truly is a fitting representation of the upcoming year.

🍑 Peachy Keen Art

Peach Fuzz Been a Part of the Visual Landscape for a Long Time

Simply signing in on Pantone’s website offers a host of additional features: access to Color of the Year mugs, notebooks, pens, and expert-curated color harmonies. The color harmonies include the earthy pink collection Libation, the colorful Flavor -Full, and the rich plum Hybrid Hues. If you like the color palettes we’ve recommended here, be sure to check out Pantone’s official guide as well.v

All color palettes below generated using Coolors.

Let’s start at the beginning with a color palette of warm, soft colors that mirror Peach Fuzz’s gentle hue. This palette allows the color of the year to blend in, infusing your whole room or design with delicate, peachy warmth.

In contrast, Peach Fuzz can be combined with a range of its complementary color – blue – in order to make it stand out. Notice how the warm bright color pops alongside these sleek cool tones.

Let’s take a step father. Still leveraging cool bluish shades, this palette adds red to play off of the warm tones in Peach Fuzz. The red and peach here will draw attention to one another against the slate-colored grays and black.

Bold and elevated, this palette kicks the earthy red up a notch with this vibrant hue. The warm colors still pop against the darker ones, however peach acts as a supporting color to the eye-catching red here.

Anyone who was or had a tween girl during the Y2K era will be familiar with this color palette, reminiscent of popular bedspreads and notebooks at the time. Today, peach and warm brown can be combined with vibrant greens and blues for a sophisticated, on-trend look.

Vibrant and creative, this palette evokes the bold colors of modern design-friendly color palettes in impressionist artwork -- just a bit more electric for the digital age. Peach Fuzz serves as one of four light, bright colors in this palette, grounded by a deep red-purple.

And last but not least, this palette is a blast from the past. Combined with rich reds and oranges, Peach Fuzz becomes an integral part of this 70s inspired color collection. Imagine shag carpet these colors on the living room floor, or point out directions to the National Park on your family road trip.

With nostalgia culture bringing back everything from 90s phenoms like Furbees and Super Nintendo franchises, to the eclectic styles Gen Z is pulling out of thrift shops and demanding to see in major retail stores, this palette is sure to be a winner in the coming year.

And this is just the beginning of Peach Fuzz palooza 🍑

This year’s Color of the Year brings with it endless possibilities. Will you add it to a website design, sport it on your tennis shoes? Will you add subtle hints to your website or social pages, or appreciate it from a distance? The choice is up to you.

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For more of our thoughts on Peach Fuzz, check this out: 2024 Color of the Year: Spring into Style by learning the Meaning and Mastery of Peach Fuzz

Boylston was contributed expert advice on design and color theory for the Apartment Guide article.