Pantone’s Colour of the Year announcement has always been about more than a colour. 

We see it as a signal of sorts – telling brands, designers, and marketers about the visual language that’s supposedly in step with culture.

This year’s colour was “Cloud Dancer”, a slightly greyish off-white hue reminiscent of wallpaper paste or an industrial adhesive (tasty) and the backlash amongst creatives has been pronounced, to say the least.

The strength of this reaction says less about the shade itself and more about a growing frustration in the world of branding: that restraint is being conflated with relevance.

When it comes to the world of luxury brand design, minimalism still dominates – and rightfully so.

The most valuable brands in the world continue to rely on space, simplicity, and an understated elegance that demands attention with merely a whisper. They don’t need ornamentation or loud, violent colour palettes to grab attention – they let their silence do the heavy lifting.

Like Keith Richards said about writing music, “sometimes it’s about what you don’t play”.

Silence only works when it’s intentional.

We’ve noticed a creeping tendency in the luxury space to hide behind neutrality. What once signalled confidence now too often signals caution.

You know the type - muted colour palettes, softened identities and stripped-back visuals. These can still be strategic choices, but they are too often simply insulation brands hide behind to avoid saying anything that might divide opinion or demand commitment.

Most then go on to label it “quiet luxury”. 

This aversion to any type of creative risk whatsoever is no longer minimalism, it’s minimal effort.

It’s not a secret that digital audiences these days are more sophisticated, clued up, and culturally alert than ever before. They understand when a brand is exercising restraint, and when it is simply being non-committal.

A neutral colour such as Pantone’s Cloud Dancer is not inherently elegant. It becomes elegant only when used tastefully, with strong authorship, and a sense of intention that feels unmistakable – and an absence of that no longer reads as refined, but as undecided.

We also can’t help but note the commercial irony at play. In moments of economic unease or cultural flux, brands often default to “timelessness” as a defense mechanism. Yet the history of luxury is built on confidence, and not consensus. Iconic identities – brands like Chanel or Ferrari or Cartier – were never neutral when they launched; they became timeless because they were actually distinctive enough to endure.

Precision, and not absence, has always been the foundation of luxury minimalism – when there are fewer elements on the page, each of those elements automatically matters more. If one simple component lacks meaning, the entire design collapses under its own weight.

This, of course, brings us back to Pantone’s Colour of the Year. 

Cloud Dancer, with its timid neutrality, illustrates exactly this tension. Minimalism is not measured by how little there is, but rather by how much weight each element carries. True minimalist design should feel intentional, rather than deliberately safe. Understated should still feel authoritative, and quiet should still feel defined. 

You can’t very well do that just by washing a page or whatever in a neutral colour.

In a market built largely on desire, playing it safe is arguably the most dangerous thing you can do.

Pantone might be dancing in the clouds, but if you’re a luxury brand looking to truly hit the mark in the world of minimalist design, you need to keep your feet on the ground.