A wide range of colour, held to one standard

Colour is the first thing a hospital decides and the last thing it stops worrying about. A ward in one shade of navy and another ward in a slightly different navy is a small thing that never stops being visible.

Most suppliers solve this by offering few colours. We went the other way, because a hospital group rarely needs one colour. It needs a system.

Our range runs to fourteen colours: navy, wine, black, heather grey, forest green, maroon, mauve, ceil blue, pastel lilac, galaxy blue, hot pink, eucalyptus, olive and military green. That is enough to give every department its own identity without leaving the family.

Two things make a range usable rather than decorative.

The first is that a colour has to exist in the styles you need. A beautiful lilac that only comes in one top is not a range, it is a sample. When we add a colour, it goes across the scrub sets, the joggers, the lab coats and the nursing line, so a department can be dressed consistently from top to trouser.

The second is that the colour has to stay the same. Fabric is dyed in lots and lots move. A navy ordered in January and again in August can arrive slightly different if nobody is checking against a reference. That is why we keep physical swatches and send them to institutions before production, to be held against the actual ward lighting rather than a screen.

There is a practical side to a wide range that people discover later. Colour is wayfinding. Paediatrics in ceil blue, theatre in green, general wards in navy, administration in black. A visitor can read the building without asking. That only works if the shades hold.

If you are choosing, order a swatch set first. Hold it against the wall, in the room, at the hour the ward is busiest. Then decide.

Range is a catalogue. Consistency is a commitment.