Francesca Valan is an industrial designer specialised in the design of colours, materials and finishes (CMF Design). She graduated in Industrial Design at the IED (Istituto Europeo di Design) in Milan in 1989 and obtained a Master in Surface Quality in 1990. She worked with Clino Castelli on colour design projects in Europe and Japan and with Jorrit Tornquist on architectural colour projects. She lives and works in Milan, where she founded her own studio in 1998.
Her activity is focused on the definition of product identity through CMF design. She makes colour plans for multinational companies (Kone, Hitachi, Technogym, Campari, Filagiotto, Samsung, Aigle, De Longhi, Magis, Tecno, Lechler, Beneteau, Brembo) and designs the colour of different types of products: from computers to office furniture, from household appliances to sporting goods, from security doors to yachts. She developed a method for the prediction of trends based on historical and statistical analysis of color by market sector, which exploits the periodicity of color preferences and the duration of cycles for product type.
She has defined the Guidelines for the colour plan of the city of Milan. She deals in particular with the world of children organising training courses for schools and educational activities in art exhibitions, and designing the colour of games and spaces for children.
She teaches CMF Design at the Master in Design & Technology at the Politecnico di Milano, at IED, at Marangoni and at the Scuola Politecnica di Milano (SPD).
She lectures in many universities and research centres in Italy and abroad and seminars at Architect Associations.
She collaborates with important design and architecture studios. Her works are published in architecture and design magazines and national and international books.
Title: Color in Industrial Design
Abstract: Color design is an activity that, dealing with different sectors in different geographical markets at the same time, allows to have a view on how the language of color evolves in product design around the world.
Color language evolves also in relation to new technologies, and color project must evolve at the same pace: colored LED lights used as new accents, online shopping based on purely digital colors, etc. require new ways of interpreting color design.
The novel concept of Chromatic Sustainability responds to the need to reduce consumption, by extending the visual life of products through the use of new finishing with iconic colors, which have a longer lifecycle on the market.
The color design of a product involves well-defined phases. Firstly, the Historical Analysis of the brand identifies iconic colors and chromatic schemes. Competitor Analysis is the second step and is essential to conquer new markets. Trend analysis is one of the best-known phases in color design and leads to the definition of new Identity Scenarios. The color Tools design is less known, but it is the most strategic phase: it collects and analyses all the color data related to the brand and allows to plan the future color strategy. Only at the end of this process color is applied to the product.
This presentation will go through all these phases and present some examples that will show how this activity not only gives a product the most suitable color, but also defines and reinforces the Brand Identity.