Peach Fuzz – Pantone Colour of the Year
How to use the 2024 Pantone Colour of the Year ‘Peach Fuzz’ in your home and garden
Warm ripe peaches
Soft summer sand
Winter morning light
Silky rose petals
Peach is a complex colour to pin down. It encompasses touches of soft gold, delicate saffron, warm orange, and dusky pink. As gardeners, while dreaming of growing your own peaches, it might conjure the thought of summer roses, the falls of an iris or the feathery seedheads of an autumn grass.
Soft peach light through autumn grasses, at RHS Garden Hyde Hall
The Institute chooses the year’s colour based on research into influences around the world, in design, art, travel, lifestyle and socio-economics. When it comes to naming the colour, they try to conjure an image and a feeling:
Once you start looking, ‘Peach Fuzz’ is everywhere in our gardens, in every shade and tone, and across each season. In spring the soft peach of daffodils, such as ‘Peach Cobbler,’ ‘Peaches and Cream’ and ‘Apricot Whirl’, are followed by the popular tulip ‘Apricot Beauty,’ as well as ‘Apricot Foxx’ and ‘Lorenzo.’ You might use these in single colours filling a beautiful container, or drop them into your borders with complementary shades.
Tulipa ‘Lorenzo’
Iris ‘Famecheck Apricot Gem’
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Glowing peach tones of Miscanthus flowerheads and autumn leaf colour create a striking group at RHS Garden Harlow Carr
Glowing peach tones of Miscanthus flowerheads and autumn leaf colour create a striking group at RHS Garden Harlow Carr
How you combine plants in a garden is purely personal and colour provokes different responses in each of us. ‘Peach Fuzz’ exudes warmth, so sits well with similar tones and shades, ranging from deep reds to bright golds, with every shade of pink and apricot in between. Paler colours shine out in dark spaces, but check the conditions the plant needs, does it require sunshine or shade, as many of the peach-toned plants are sun-lovers.
The warm tone of the grass Stipa tenuissima, provides a sunlit backdrop to the dark flowers of Salvia nemorosa ‘Caradonna’ and Knautia macedonica Melton pastels at RHS Hyde Hall
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Glandularia Lanai Peach, sometimes known as Verbena, in a light tone, which works well in containers
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Shades of light and dark – Cotinus ‘Grace’ and Calamagrostis × acutiflora ‘Karl Foerster’ at RHS Garden Hyde Hall
Glandularia Lanai Peach, sometimes known as Verbena, in a light tone, which works well in containers
Shades of light and dark – Cotinus ‘Grace’ and Calamagrostis × acutiflora ‘Karl Foerster’ at RHS Garden Hyde Hall
‘Peach Fuzz’ can also be found in hard landscaping materials. Timber is a warm colour, so by using wood to create raised beds, steps and pergolas you can bring warmth to the structures of your garden. Self-binding gravel has a soft yellowy-pink tone and works well on paths. Earthy tones of bricks and pavers create soft, underfoot shades for plants to spill onto, with sunlovers such as Geum and irises enjoying the heat that radiates from the warmed surfaces.
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Peachy tones of timber and brick blend well together and enhance planting. (Arrange: Rearrange Countryside Garden. Designed by: Anna Rhodes & Joshua McDonnell. RHS Flower Show Tatton Park 2017)
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Self-binding gravel allows water to permeate the ground and is great for paths. (The Thames Water Flourishing Future Garden. Designed by Tony Woods. RHS Hampton Court Palace Garden Festival 2019)
Peachy tones of timber and brick blend well together and enhance planting. (Arrange: Rearrange Countryside Garden. Designed by: Anna Rhodes & Joshua McDonnell. RHS Flower Show Tatton Park 2017)
Self-binding gravel allows water to permeate the ground and is great for paths. (The Thames Water Flourishing Future Garden. Designed by Tony Woods. RHS Hampton Court Palace Garden Festival 2019)
Pots and containers are often made from terracotta, which comes in many shades and shows off the variety of foliage plants. Large pots can be grouped with smaller ones to add impact.
Peachy perfection – pots can be used in any space, big or small. (Pots and Pithoi tradestand at RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2023)
Peach tones are often found in houseplants but don’t forget the pot colour and also the location – you could use warm peach shades of wood or ceramic to create a montage in your home.
The Nurture Landscapes Garden, designed by Sarah Price for the RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2023, was a masterclass in utilising colour, texture and form to create a garden that oozed warmth. Soft gravel and brick paths led visitors on a journey around the planting, to seating made from aged timber. Stunning earthenware pots and water bowls sat amongst the pastel-coloured planting, and the peach tones of the backdrop walls complimented both the soft and hard landscaping.
Benches, pots and focal points in soft earthy tones in The Nurture Landscapes Garden, designed by Sarah Price. RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2023
Sarah Price created a warm backdrop of peachy toned walls, and soft paths underfoot using gravel and brick in her RHS Chelsea Show Garden 2023
- Find inspiration for using colour in your garden by visiting RHS Gardens and Partner Gardens, RHS Shows or browsing the RHS Website.
- Explore the RHS Digital Collections which spans over 500 years of garden history, art and science.
