Before Pantone

Every tool that I relied upon when I first started in graphic design has become pretty much obsolete. Except one. Sure, I pull out my trusty X-acto knife and burnishers on the rare occasion that I need to assemble a comp. I have been known to use my old Design markers from time to time, but never professionally. Can’t say the last time I needed my T-square or assortment of triangles (the good ones saved for inking or the beat-up ones that I used for trimming). And recently, I finally broke down and tossed my collection of rapidographs (let’s face facts, once a 000 pen got clogged, it was never going to be unclogged and usable again).

The exception… my Pantone color books, a designer’s tried and true friends. We’ve been together through thick and thin from the days of paste up to the first computers with black and white (yikes, black and white) monitors to today’s hi-def, (supposedly) color-accurate printers. Every designer I know uses a Pantone book. Yes, the swatch numbering has changed (still don’t understand that Plus system), but they continue to have an honored place on my desk, always within reach.

So who knew that the first color books where not designed for the graphic arts? Not me. As this article in Smithsonian relates, the first color books or dictionaries where used by scientists and naturalists (like Darwin) to catalog plants, animals, and birds. My handy Pantone books are direct descendants of those early 19th-century color dictionaries. With a legacy like that, I am guessing my swatch books are going the be on my desk for a long time to come.