Get ready to be soothed and inspired by Cloud Dancer, a "billowy white imbued with serenity”... Or not.
We’ve had 2025’s Spotify Wrapped, Wikipedia’s most searched pages of the year, the most googled terms and several words of the year have been announced... Now it’s time to look ahead to next year and the colour that will apparently define 2026.
The colour of the year, as decided by the Pantone Colour Institute, is a very discrete hue of white known as "Cloud Dancer 11-4201."
Pantone has described it as a "lofty white that serves as a symbol of calming influence in a society rediscovering the value of quiet reflection".
How calmingly minimalist, sophisticated, and not at all pretentious.
The colour of the year aims to capture the cultural zeitgeist and means we could be seeing brands adopting this colour and more celebrities wearing it on red carpets... Fashion magazine Marie Claire has already said that Cloud Dancer is trending, citing Jennifer Lawrence, Dakota Johnson and Priyanka Chopra as A-listers who are already wearing the colour.
So, goodbye 2025’s chocolatey brown called Mocha Mousse, and it’s hello to... white.
Granted, who doesn’t want a “billowy white imbued with serenity” which apparently “invites true relaxation and focus, allowing the mind to wander and creativity to breathe”? Sounds delightful. But it’s hardly a very inspired choice, and critics have pointed out that the optics aren’t all that great...
Given the current political climate and Donald Trump’s anti-immigration policies, many have called out Cloud Dancer as a loaded choice.
Some are calling the choice “dystopian”, especially in the recent context of Trump referring to Somali immigrants as “garbage”; others say it’s “giving I’ve got good jeans” - in reference to Sydney Sweeney’s controversial American Eagle ad and its eugenic undertones; while another commented: "I can't think of a more appropriate colour than klansman white."
Vanessa Friedman, the fashion director and chief fashion critic of the New York Times said that "given the recent political discourse, when I hear 'white,' less salubrious associations also leap to my mind - ones that I doubt Pantone took into consideration but that could be twisted to pretty uncomfortable ends."
As Vanity Fair writes: "After a year plus of efforts by the Trump administration and corporations to roll back diversity, equity and inclusion programs alongside aggressive immigration crackdowns, it feels bold, and dare I say out of touch, to utter the words 'white is the colour of 2026.'”
Calming for some, tone deaf for others. One thing’s for sure: Adopt Cloud Dancer 11-4201, and you could be looking at some overflowing laundry baskets in 2026. Anyone who’s ever eaten spaghetti while wearing a white shirt can attest to the fact that those stains are resilient.
Come to think of it, we might be sticking with Mocha Mousse for another year.
