Pink was for boys, blue was for girls…

 

Pink was originally a colour for boys and blue was originally a colour for girls. Pink was seen as a version of red, a very masculine colour. And blue was a colour associated with icons of the Virgin Mary and therefore a very feminine colour. Pink fabric was much more expensive to produce so maybe that was the reason? Things changed after the second world war. Could this be because the Nazis forced homosexual people to wear a pink triangle?

Read more here

And in other news:

  • We trust companies with blue logos (e.g. PayPal)
  • Men and women see colours differently

Read more here

Author: Janet Carr

Fashion, beauty and animal loving language consultant from South Africa living in Stockholm, Sweden.

3 thoughts

  1. This was covered by QI back in 2010:

    https://youtu.be/MY8cUs2Cc1U?si=RQIHEzy_1ZGj67mu

    The Nazis used a whole raft of markings for various classifications of people:

    https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/classification-system-in-nazi-concentration-camps

    A hifi turntable manufacturer, founded by two gay men, used the name ‘Pink Triangle’:

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pink_Triangle_(audio_manufacturer)

    I always wonder at pictures showing how different people, or animals see things differently; it’s a bit like TV adverts for TVs trying to demonstrate the superior image quality of the new TV. On, presumably, an inferior TV…

  2. I didn’t know that about pink being associated with boys in previous centuries. I did know that Nazi Germany required Jews to wear a star of David prominently displayed so that came as no shock to discover that they required homosexuals (who they also sent to concentration camps) to display a symbol of their sexual preference. Thank you for all the informative information you continue to unearth for us.

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