MBD121: 10 Colors That Mean Different Things Around the World

2 February 2025 | Issue #121

In this issue:

Color Meanings from Around the World
Top AI Image Generators for 2026
Design Quote of the Week

"Blue is the color of trust."

"Green is used when you want to look natural."

"Red is an aggressive color."

At some point, we were taught the meanings behind colors. But what if I told you those meanings aren't universal?

Color is never just color. What appears as a simple wavelength of light carries centuries of meaning, shaped by religion, history, and cultural experience. A color that signifies celebration in one culture might represent mourning in another. For marketers, designers, and anyone communicating across cultural boundaries, understanding these differences isn't just interesting. It's essential.

The Complexity Beneath the Surface

When we choose colors for a brand, a website, or a campaign, we're rarely thinking about the cultural baggage those colors carry. But that baggage is real, and it varies dramatically across the globe.

The meaning of black in different cultures.

Black: From Sophistication to Spirituality

Black demonstrates how a single color can hold contradictory meanings even within similar cultural contexts. In Western societies, black carries the weight of mourning and rebellion, but also sophistication and formality. Think of the little black dress or the black tie event.

Move to Africa, and black transforms into a symbol of age, wisdom, and masculinity: qualities revered and associated with maturity and knowledge. In China, black represents high quality and is considered a color for boys, while in Japan it evokes night, mystery, and the unknown.

Indian culture adds another layer, viewing black through the lens of evil and darkness, yet also apathy and negativity. Thai tradition associates black with unhappiness and bad luck. Each culture has processed this darkest of colors through its own historical and spiritual lens.

The meaning of colors in different cultures

In Western cultures, white symbolizes purity, peace, and new beginnings: white wedding dresses and white doves. But in many Eastern cultures, including China, India, and Japan, white is the color of death and mourning. A Western company launching a product in an Asian market with pristine white packaging might unknowingly be sending a very different message than intended.

Yellow: Optimism Meets Caution

Yellow presents marketers with a fascinating challenge. In Western contexts, yellow radiates happiness, joy, and optimism: it's literally sunshine. But it also signals caution (caution tape, warning signs) and energy.

Eastern cultures elevate yellow to sacred status. In many Asian traditions, yellow connects to sacredness, royalty, and power. Chinese culture associates yellow with nourishment, honor, and masculinity, while Indian traditions link it to merchants, sacredness, and peace.

European interpretations add hope, happiness, and hazards to yellow's meaning, while in Africa it represents wealth and high ranking in religion. Thailand designates yellow as the color for Monday and associates it with Buddhism and royalty.

Green: Nature's Color, Culture's Variable

Green's association with nature is nearly universal, but how cultures interpret that connection differs meaningfully. Western societies link green with nature, spring, and environmental consciousness, but also jealousy (as in "green with envy").

In Eastern traditions, green represents new life, eternity, and wealth. Islamic cultures particularly revere green, associating it with fertility, strength, and luck. In Africa, green symbolizes growth and wealth, while in China it connects to spring, youth, and fertility.

European interpretations add confidence and jealousy to the mix, while India sees green through the lens of Islam, hope, and nature. The environmental movement has given green new global associations with sustainability and eco-consciousness, but local cultural meanings still resonate strongly.

Blue: The Color of Trust...Usually

Blue enjoys remarkable consistency across many cultures as a symbol of trust, loyalty, and authority. Western brands have leveraged this for decades: think of the prevalence of blue in corporate logos, particularly in finance and technology.

But dig deeper and variations emerge. In Western contexts, blue also represents sadness and depression (feeling "blue"). Eastern cultures associate blue with immortality, wealth, and self-cultivation. European traditions add truth and responsibility to the mix.

In Africa, blue means safety and protection, while in China it represents immortality and femininity. Japanese culture links blue with calm, dignity, and hope. Middle Eastern traditions associate blue with wealth, while in India it brings mercy, strength, and bravery.

Purple: Royalty's Reach

Purple's association with royalty and wealth stems from historical scarcity: purple dye was once extraordinarily expensive to produce. This meaning persists across many cultures, but with interesting variations.

Western traditions link purple with royalty, spirituality, and luxury. Eastern cultures add wealth, nobility, and sorrow to the mix. European interpretations emphasize royalty and power, while Africa sees purple as a symbol of healing, royalty, and creativity.

In China, purple means love and romance, while Indian culture connects it to sorrow and unhappiness. Japanese tradition associates purple with wealth, privilege, and good health. Italian culture links purple to death, mourning, and nobility: a reminder that even prestigious colors can carry darker associations.

Pink: The Gender Color That Wasn't Always

Pink's association with femininity in Western cultures is relatively recent: before the mid-20th century, pink was often considered a color for boys. Today, Western pink screams love, romance, and femininity, sometimes to the point of limiting its use in other contexts.

Eastern cultures take a different view, with pink representing marriage and feminine qualities but also tenderness. European traditions associate pink with flirtation, sensitivity, and femininity. In Africa, pink means femininity, mildness, and spirituality.

Chinese culture sees pink as a symbol of joy and love, while Indian traditions connect pink to celebrations and weddings. Thai culture designates pink as the color for Tuesday, and Japanese tradition links it to spring, femininity, and good health.

Red: Universal Intensity, Divergent Meanings

Red might be the most universally intense color, but what that intensity means varies dramatically. In Western contexts, red signals danger and anger, but also stop signs and blood: warnings that demand attention. Yet it's also the color of passion, romance, and femininity (particularly when shifted toward pink).

Eastern cultures have embraced red with far more positive associations. In China, red means prosperity, good fortune, happiness, and celebration: it dominates weddings and festivals. Indian culture links red with purity, love, sensuality, and wealth, while in Japan it represents life, passion, and strength.

For marketers, this creates both opportunity and risk. A red "call to action" button might perform differently in Shanghai than in Stockholm, not just because of design preferences, but because of deeply embedded cultural associations.

Orange: Energy Across Borders

Orange pulses with energy in nearly every cultural context, though the specific qualities attributed to that energy vary. Western cultures see orange as representing vitality, excitement, and adventure: it's an active, dynamic color.

Eastern traditions associate orange with happiness, good fortune, and spirituality, particularly through its connection to Buddhism. Indian culture emphasizes orange's sacred nature through its association with purity, courage, and sacrifice.

In Africa, orange symbolizes energy and enthusiasm, while in China it represents harvest, warmth, and vitality. Japanese culture links orange to love, happiness, and courage. Brazilian traditions see orange as a symbol of vitality, warmth, and passion.

Brown: The Overlooked Neutral

Brown often gets overlooked in discussions of color symbolism, but it carries significant meaning across cultures. Western societies associate brown with comfort, stability, and nature: it's earthy and practical.

Eastern traditions link brown to earth and mourning, while European cultures see it as representing masculinity. In Africa, brown symbolizes the color of the land itself, connecting to place and identity.

Chinese culture associates brown with earth, stability, and reliability, while Indian traditions see brown as a symbol of mourning. Thai culture designates brown as a color representing simplicity, and Japanese tradition connects it to earth, strength, and durability.

Why This Matters for Visual Marketing

Understanding color symbolism isn't about memorizing a chart: it's about recognizing that meaning is constructed, not inherent. The same color can tell completely different stories depending on who's looking at it.

For marketers and designers working across cultural boundaries, this creates several imperatives:

Research is non-negotiable. Before launching a campaign in a new market, understand the local color associations. What works in New York might fall flat (or worse, offend) in New Delhi.

Context matters more than rules. While cultural color associations are real, they don't operate in isolation. A color's meaning shifts based on how it's used, what it's paired with, and what the overall message conveys.

Globalization is creating hybrid meanings. Younger, more globally connected audiences often hold both traditional and Western color associations simultaneously. A Chinese millennial might associate red with both celebration and danger, depending on context.

Test, don't assume. Even with research, the only way to know how a color choice will perform is to test it with real audience members from the target culture.

The Future of Color in Global Marketing

As our world becomes more connected, color symbolism is evolving. Some meanings are globalizing: green's association with environmental sustainability, for instance, transcends many cultural boundaries. Others are hybridizing, with younger generations holding multiple, sometimes contradictory color associations.

The rise of digital design has also created new considerations. Colors render differently on screens than in print, and screen settings vary globally. A carefully chosen shade of red might appear quite different to viewers in different regions on different devices.

Yet despite these changes, deep cultural associations with color persist. They're embedded in language (feeling blue, green with envy, seeing red), in ritual (white weddings, red envelopes, orange robes), and in centuries of shared meaning-making.

Designing with Cultural Intelligence

The most sophisticated approach to color in global marketing isn't to avoid cultural meaning but to engage with it thoughtfully. This might mean:

Creating region-specific versions of campaigns that honor local color associations
Choosing colors that carry positive associations across multiple target cultures
Using color in ways that transcend cultural specificity: through emotion, contrast, or hierarchy
Pairing color choices with other cultural signals that help clarify intended meaning

Color is one of the most powerful tools in the visual marketer's toolkit. But like any powerful tool, it requires skill and understanding to use well. The same red that energizes a Chinese New Year campaign could signal danger in a Western context. The white that represents purity in a Western wedding dress represents mourning in many Eastern traditions.

Conclusion: Seeing Color Clearly

Perhaps the most important lesson from international color symbolism is humility. What seems obvious to us (that blue means calm, or pink means feminine, or black means formal) is actually a learned cultural association. Someone from a different culture might look at the same color and see something entirely different, not because they're wrong but because they've learned a different visual language.

For those of us working in visual communication, this is both a challenge and an opportunity. The challenge is to move beyond our own cultural assumptions and truly understand how our work will be received across different contexts. The opportunity is to create work that speaks meaningfully to people across cultural boundaries, honoring rather than ignoring the rich tapestry of meaning that color carries.

Color may be universal: every culture has access to the same visible spectrum. But meaning is cultural, specific, and deeply human. Understanding that distinction is what separates good visual communication from great visual communication.

And in our increasingly connected world, that understanding has never been more valuable.

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THE VISUAL MARKETER

This color breakdown originally appeared in the book, The Visual Marketer.

BEST AI IMAGE GENERATORS

I recently published a guide that shows the differences between different image generators using the same prompt.

DESIGN QUOTE OF THE WEEK

“Art is the only place you can do what you like. That’s freedom.” – Paula Rego

My AI disclaimer: The main article is based on a section of my book, The Visual Marketer. I created new graphics and had Claude help me rewrite the article.

Hero image prompt: Ten people dressed in the following styles: Japan - Kimono and yukata with intricate patterns, obi sashes, and specific seasonal variations. India - Sari, salwar kameez, and lehenga choli with vibrant colors and elaborate embroidery. Scotland - Kilts with tartan patterns specific to clans, sporrans, and traditional highland dress. Morocco - Djellaba and caftan with ornate embroidery, often in rich jewel tones. Peru - Traditional Andean dress including layered skirts (polleras), bowler hats, and colorful woven textiles. Nigeria - Agbada, buba, and gele head wraps with bold African prints and fabrics. Thailand - Traditional Thai silk garments like the sinh (wrapped skirt) and sabai (shoulder cloth). Mexico - Huipil embroidered blouses, rebozos, and traditional indigenous textiles with regional variations. Kenya (Maasai) - Shuka (checkered cloth wraps) in red and other colors, elaborate beaded jewelry. And a traditional American woman. They are standing in a group, and we can see everyone from a 3/4 view. A vibrant, high-contrast illustration using flat vector-style shading with neon and duotone color blocking. The characters are stylized with exaggerated lighting in cyan and magenta tones, set against a yellow background. There’s a strong use of shadow and highlight to create depth without using gradients. It uses clean lines and a minimal background to keep focus on the figures and objects. --ar 16:9

If AI generates the images, I include the prompt so you can see how I got to that image.