A Masterclass in Colour with Carl Hansen & Etté Colour
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Time to read 3 min
Colour is a powerful medium for creating an atmosphere. Every shade carries its own personal and cultural associations, influencing how we experience a space. When used intentionally, colour becomes more than decoration; it can change the mood, influence perception and bring life to an interior. This spring, as we welcomed the start of our Carl Hansen & Søn brand takeover on the top floor of our Bath showroom, this idea became the centre of an evening dedicated to colour and the emotional power of interiors.
Carl Hansen’s furniture, admired for its balance of Danish craftsmanship, material honesty and timeless forms, now sits within a completely reimagined setting. The walls have been drenched in an earthy ochre tone, while the window frames have been picked out in a rich red pigment that shifts subtly throughout the day depending on the changing light in the showroom. It is warm but grounded. Bold but remarkably calm.
Take a closer look at the Carl Hansen takeover at our Bath showroom.
The Cornerstones of Joy with Etté Colour
To celebrate the launch of the takeover, we invited Despina Curtis and Natalie Jones, founders of Etté Colour, to host a presentation exploring their recent curation of the Carl Hansen flagship showroom in Clerkenwell for London Craft Week.
Their installation, titled The Cornerstones of Joy, explored how colour can move beyond aesthetics into something more emotional and experiential, using Carl Hansen’s iconic furniture as the framework for a deeply immersive environment.
The starting point for the project was deceptively simple: joy.
Despina and Natalie explained that over the recent years, the wider design landscape has leaned towards soft neutrals, quiet minimalism and carefully controlled palettes. Rather than rejecting that entirely, their approach questioned what might happen if colour was allowed to feel optimistic again. Not chaotic or overpowering, but emotionally generous.
From that idea emerged five “Cornerstones of Joy”: liveness, expansion, spontaneity, presence and connection. These themes informed a palette of fourteen colours, inspired by the fourteen structural components of Hans J. Wegner’s iconic Wishbone Chair. It is an approach that feels particularly fitting for Carl Hansen, where construction and beauty have always existed inseparably from one another.
The colour palette was defined into six colour categories: spontaneous colours, iridescent colours, holographic colours, connecting/pause colours, expansion colours and anchoring neutrals. They described that through these categories, contrast became central to the installation’s atmosphere. Fabrics from Kvadrat were layered transparently across the Clerkenwell showroom windows, so colours shifted as visitors walked through the space. Highly textured lime paints from St. Leo introduced movement and depth into the rooms.
Classic Carl Hansen pieces were also transformed through unexpected finishes and upholstery choices. The Wishbone Chair, so often seen in natural oak or soap-treated finishes, appeared in Hollyhock – an almost electric yellow from an Ilse Crawford palette – positioned against deep blue-violet walls. Rather than disguising the furniture, colour revealed different personalities within pieces we thought we already knew.
This idea resonated strongly within our own showroom transformation in Bath. The ochre walls on our top floor introduce warmth that feels particularly suited to Carl Hansen’s natural materials and handcrafted details. The deep red window surrounds create moments of depth and framing, drawing the eye outward towards Bath’s Georgian architecture while grounding the furniture internally within the room.
It is a reminder that Scandinavian design has never truly been about minimalism alone. At its best, it has always balanced form with atmosphere, precision with softness and functionality with emotional comfort. Colour becomes part of that conversation rather than an interruption to it.
An Evening of Colour and Creativity
As the evening continued, guests were invited to create their own colour palettes, creating abstract images and exploring how different colour combinations can create emotion and mood. The showroom was filled with conversations about pigment, texture, craftsmanship and materiality while experiencing the Carl Hansen furniture firsthand. There was a noticeable sense of curiosity in the room, not only about colour itself but also about the possibilities it opens within interiors when approached with greater confidence and imagination.
The most valuable takeaway from the event was that colour does not need to dominate a space in order to transform it. Sometimes it simply needs to be used with enough imagination and intention, pairing unexpected colour combinations, accents and textures together to bring life and emotion to an interior.
Alongside our event with Etté Colour, we were also lucky enough to hold a Carl Hanson Wishbone Chair weaving workshop. Read about the weaving process in our interview with Benny, a skilled weaver from Carl Hanson’s workshop in Denmark.
Discover the history of Carl Hansen & Søn and their integral place within Danish design heritage.
Explore the iconic Wishbone Chair and more in our collection of Carl Hansen & Søn furniture, lighting and homeware.
Written by Stephanie Keel:
A lover of good design and recently a new resident to Ludlow life, Stephanie is our in house copywriter, documenting everything from her favourite parts of the product to the beautiful interiors you’d find them in. You’ll often find her in a well-designed coffee shop, with laptop in hand.