International Design

Color and cultural sensitivity: the meanings that don’t travel

Color meaning is culturally constructed, not universal. White means purity in Western contexts and mourning in several East Asian ones. Red means danger or passion in the West and luck and prosperity in Chinese cultural contexts. Green carries Islamic significance that makes it a problematic default for secular decorative use in the Middle East. A product designed for a single cultural market can be inadvertently offensive or simply baffling in another. Understanding which color associations are culturally specific — and which are broadly cross-cultural — is essential for international product design.