For this year’s Colormix^® Forecast, we dive deep below the surface of color trend prediction to connect large-scale trend stories to the design strategies and colors that help us tell them. In the inaugural episode of our debut podcast, Colormixology^™, host and designer Sue Wadden and designer Emily Kantz of our own Trendsight Team discuss the influences and inspiration behind the 2025 Colormix^® Forecast, Capsules—available wherever you get your podcasts.

Our global trend analysis factors in everything from shifting lifestyles to emerging technologies, from evolving mindsets to resurfacing ideals. Check out the podcast for more, and keep reading to explore the most detailed picture of color and design our expert Trendsight Team has ever compiled.

Our Trendsight Team members possess decades of combined experience from a myriad of design backgrounds and cultural perspectives. Each year, they attend industry trade shows, conferences and conventions, conduct their own research, and travel the world to such color-rich and design-forward sources of trend inspiration as Salone Di Mobile, Euro Cucina, and FuoriSalone in Milan and Maison&Objet in Paris.

“We spent our time immersing ourselves in the world of innovative European design, focusing on trends we’re seeing in the marketplace with an eye toward the future of color direction,” Trendsight Team member Maggie O’Hare recalls of the team’s recent sojourn to Milan. “I find it incredibly interesting to see how color tastes morph over time and region, and how much of that color ‘starts’ in Europe.”

This extensive research and data gathering culminates in our annual Colormix trendcasting workshop, where experts from Latin America, Europe, North America, and across different subject matter specialties come together to compile their findings. Each forecaster presents their richly detailed insights and observations, then the team identifies the universal macro trend directions that will come to define the forecast.

With Capsules, our experts have created a comprehensive designer resource that contains implications for both residential and commercial design—as well as the colors, materials, and finishes that will bring those spaces to life—in 2025.

Authenticity has been identified as the newest and truest kind of luxury. This concept embodies a beautiful evolution of biophilic design through thoughtful representation of raw and real natural processes, as well as an intuitive integration of modern advances with our inherent states of being.

In Commercial Design
Today’s commercial designs demonstrate appreciation for sophisticated simplicity, with a trend toward understated aesthetics, natured-inspired elegance, and an instinctive sense of flow in furniture silhouettes, architectural elements, and lighting.

Materials and Finishes
This trend shift hinges on creating sustainable patterns by considering the entire lifecycle of products, refreshing and revitalizing spaces by combining luxurious finishes with natural wood, raw stone, woven grasses, and other organic materials and textures. 

The Color Capsule: Chrysalis
The colors that tell this story can be found in the Chrysalis color capsule: a rich palette of neutrals inspired by wood tones, sifting sands, and freshly turned earth.

This trend represents the fusion of diametric themes in today’s interiors. Designs are characterized as whimsical yet well-rounded; off the beaten path but broadly appealing, with an unlikely combination of light-heartedness and depth that encourages us to rethink traditional conceptions of design.

In Residential Design
Dopamine decorating figures prominently, allowing for an unorthodox blending of styles to create spaces that are striking, satisfying, and achieved with a serendipitous approach that allows designers to push the limits of imagination.

In Commercial Design
Slightly surreal commercial designs inspire active immersion in the environment, transforming workplaces, businesses, and education or healthcare spaces into dramatic destinations that draw people in. This trend embraces the wildest creative ideas where postmodern shapes and joyful, jarring pops of color take the spotlight.

Materials and Finishes
On the surface, this trend direction plays with bold color and pattern, but its underlying ethos of creative boundary-crossing extends to materials and finishes as well, encouraging unexpected shapes and showpieces, layering and lighting.

The Color Capsule: Paradox
Electric brights, grounding neutrals, and candy-coated accents can be found in the Paradox color capsule, representative of the curious combinations this key trend direction inspires.

Timeliness and timelessness are tightly interwoven in this key trend direction. Contemporary designs pay tribute to beloved styles and motifs of the past by reimagining them without merely replicating them, and artisanal touches and unique cross-cultural elements complete the picture.

In Residential Design
Time-honored techniques and deep connections to the earth are reinterpreted in modern design contexts, enriched by a wide mix of artistic and historical influences. In today’s homes, this emerging design philosophy incorporates themes from diverse cultures and eras to transcend time and space.

In Commercial Design
To mirror the effect in residential design, commercial environments also exude a strong sense of place. The hyperlocal meets the global, and comfort and familiarity can be found as we go about our daily lives—at work, at school, in healthcare facilities and beyond.

Materials and Finishes
Handmade accents nod to the importance of preserving and revitalizing ancient wisdom. This trend may reveal itself in a mosaic of materials, but especially when specifying flooring, wood coatings, and other products that support the longevity of a space.

The Color Capsule: Wellspring
Mystical blues, meditative midtones, and compelling colors abound to weave the timeless narrative of the Wellspring color capsule.

This trend is focused on a growing awareness of diverse needs, community betterment, and a collective sense of responsibility to one another. Designs in this trend space encapsulate a shift toward not only acknowledging but actively embracing the most beautiful aspects of diversity.

In Residential Design
Collaborative living and shared experiences gain strength in direct response to modern individualism. This trend manifests in design strategies that allow homes to adapt to the changing needs of homeowners over time, as well as decorating decisions rooted in highly personal and self-expressive client preferences.

In Commercial Design
Business owners are becoming more aware of the importance of accessibility. By implementing supportive wayfinding through a building, or by designing “third places” with a sense of home-like connectedness for guests, visitors, tenants, or employees, inclusive design will lead to long-term success and growth.

Materials and Finishes
This trend is driven by a sense of abundance and care. Materials that are sourced from the local environment, as well as materials handmade by artisans in the area, are being used in both residential and commercial design to connect spaces to the community and culture of a place.

The Color Capsule: Kindred
The Kindred color capsule contains warm-hearted and optimistic colors that span a broad gamut of tones and tints to represent today’s most nurturing and inclusive designs.

Learn even more about this year’s forecast from Trendsight Team members on the first episode of our debut podcast, Colormixology^™, available wherever you get your podcasts. Order your designer-exclusive lookbook and bring the forecast to life with complimentary color samples, available using your PRO+ account.