Methuen Handbook of Color

By A Korenerup & J H Wanscher
Politikens Forlag, Copenhagen
Methuen London
1961 / 1989 ISBN 0-413-33400-7

Methuen writes:

The third edition of this authoritative pocket color book covers the essentials of color practice and includes an international dictionary of colors with British standard equivalents. A universal ready reference for all those whose jobs or recreation involves color, it now includes names of colors used by British paint manufacturers and colors traditionally associated with the printing ink industry, thus shedding light on the whole field of color in art and science.

The color book is divided into two parts, the Handbook proper and a Color Dictionary. The Handbook explains the basic facts upon which all systems of color identification are based, and describes some important visual effects that apply to color usage generally. The Dictionary consists of plates of 1266 color samples accompanied by descriptive glossaries of color names with an easy cross reference system.

The Color Dictionary is so contrived that a color sample of one’s own can be compared with the charted samples, and an appropriate name selected for it from the color diagrams. On the other hand, the appearance of a named color can be discovered by looking up the color name in alphabetical list and following the reference symbol to the appropriate place on the color plates.

Lists of color names used by British paint manufacturers and those used by the printing ink industry are included, set out in such a way that they can be readily compared with the colors reproduced in the Dictionary.