Sheep on roofs, traffic cones and a little bit of Elland Road
Some Colour Palettes are harder to narrow down than others.
Leeds was definitely one of them.
There are the obvious architectural landmarks and sporting references, but the colours I really enjoy finding are usually the ones with a slightly stranger story attached.
And Leeds has given me plenty of those.
So, after quite a bit of changing, swapping and generally wondering how on earth I was going to get Leeds into six swatches, here it is: The Leeds Colour Palette.
Six colours inspired by Leeds
The finished palette begins with Barrel Man Bronze, inspired by the familiar bronze figure at Trinity Leeds.
Next comes one of my favourite stories in the whole collection: Temple Sheep Green.
Temple Works was designed with an enormous grass-covered roof and, brilliantly, sheep were once used to graze it. There aren’t many Colour Palettes where researching industrial architecture ends with sheep.
Otley Run Orange celebrates another unmistakably Leeds sight: the traffic-cone costumes that regularly appear among the assorted fancy dress making its way along the city’s famous Otley Run.
Then comes a blast of Water Taxi Yellow, inspired by the bright yellow boats travelling along the Aire between the city centre and Leeds Dock.
The magnificent Leeds Corn Exchange gives us Corn Exchange Cream, while the final colour really couldn’t be anything other than white.
Elland Road White celebrates Leeds United and the generations of players and supporters who have made the club such a huge part of the city’s identity.
The Leeds Colour Palette
So here they are:
BARREL MAN BRONZE
TEMPLE SHEEP GREEN
OTLEY RUN ORANGE
WATER TAXI YELLOW
CORN EXCHANGE CREAM
ELLAND ROAD WHITE
Six colours that take us from Victorian architecture and industrial ingenuity to football, boats and fancy-dress pub crawls.
New Leeds gifts
The new Leeds Colour Palette is available across a collection of Leeds gifts, including ceramic mugs, framed and unframed wall art, coasters and fridge magnets.
They’re designed for people who love Leeds, whether you were born there, studied there, support the football club, moved away or simply have some very fond memories of an Otley Run you may or may not entirely remember.
I hope Leeds likes its colours.