Callum Designs predicts Aqua Mist as the colour for 2025

Callum Designs has announced its first Colour of the Year prediction and for 2025 that colour is, drumroll please, Aqua Mist. Slightly brighter than the aqua hue synonymous with the famous Tiffany brand, it’s a blue green that conveys not only freshness and vibrancy, but calmness as well.

Charlotte Jones is the colour, materials and finishes designer at the consultancy and Car Design News spoke to her at the announcement, in the very traditional environment of The Leathersellers in the City of London.

“Throughout the year we are talking trends and looking at colours for different projects,” she says. “We got to a point where we decided we could put this out into the world and show the trends and mindsets of how we look at colour and what we want to do with it in the coming year.”

Some of the inspiration for the choice of Aqua Mist has come from the work Callum Designs is doing with mobility needs charity, Motability, on the eVITA concept vehicle. They have been looking at how colour can affect Motability’s clients in different ways and how it similarly affects other clients too.

“A lot of people are looking at their spaces and how they’re affected by colour,” says Jones. “We looked at colour for the year ahead to find something that would be innovative and forward thinking, but we also looked at the spectrum of mental health and achieving a sense of calming tranquility.”

Colour has always been as much about emotion as it has style, whether in automotive design, interiors, fashion or tech. In Aqua Mist, Jones says the green properties of it provides tranquility and the feeling of health, while the blue tones convey softness and calm. Combining the two creates a hue that is both inviting and provides a punchiness that Jones says will be perfectly in step for 2025.

Aqua Mist is the result of extensive research into trends, but Callum Designs also wants to be seen as forward thinking and influencing future trends by creating its Colour of the Year. Jones says it reflects the innovation the consultancy is displaying across its work as well as in the realm of colour.

Bridge of Weir teamed up with Callum Designs at the announcement to showcase the new colours across some of its products, as well as the leather-maker’s new Conscious Collection. Admittedly, an interior finished purely in Aqua Mist might be a bit much, a bit too Mansory, but there are many ways to incorporate it into designs.

“As an exterior colour, it will sit well under the sun in certain climates,” she says, “but interior-wise, it would be a bold move to have it all. For accent details and stitching the colour works well and it can also be used for details on tech as it represents a lot of the tech that is coming through at the moment.”

In order to better balance the striking nature of Aqua Mist, Callum has come up with two other colours to complement it: Midnight Tide and Neon Riot.

“These are the colours that we’ve married with our Colour of the Year, not necessarily as trends but how we want to play with the colours in an environment,” she says. “Midnight Tide provides a bit more softness and Neon Riot adds a vibrancy and boldness.”

Not surprisingly Neon Riot reflects the trend created by the Barbie movie, but it does exactly what the team wanted, to create a statement. The trio of colours are all about being energetic and approachable, providing vibrancy and sophistication, all in carefully curated ways.

The team are looking to apply the new colours across everything from consumer goods to interior design, but primarily in automotive. Neither Jones nor designers from Bridge of Weir would divulge any secrets, but we gather luggage is being planned – and a new sports car.

Could we see the colours being used on the first car to wear the Callum badge, the Skye? We were given a sneak peek at the Skye’s interior, but for now we are sworn to secrecy, so you‘ll have to wait until 11 December to see what the team have created.