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Summer Colors Of Travel
Summer is officially upon us! During this season of warm weather and sunshine, chances are you’ll be doing some traveling. Like most industries, we’ve seen quite shift occur in the travel realm over the years due to the rise in social media (if you escape to a stunning destination and don’t document it online, did it even really happen?) While this seems to be a popular practice for humans in general, it’s especially the case with influencers. The internet is dripping with more photos than ever of wanderlust-seeking individuals documenting their adventures all around the globe. Given the rise in this trend, we were curious to take a closer look at these travel photos and study what makes them so appealing. We partnered with Wagstaff Worldwide, Visit Carlsbad and Pantone to conduct a study to discover the top trending colors in travel as they appeared in top engaging influencer content.
To do this, we established 20+ of the top influencers in the travel space. These influencers were an even mix of travel photography, outdoor photography, as well as lifestyle. Influencers ranged from having 200,000 followers to over 2.9M followers. We specifically focused on those who had traveled to at least 3+ distinct locations in the continental United States over the course of 1-year. We included an even mix of both male and female influencers in the millennial age demographic.
Once we identified our set group of influencers, we found their top engaging posts from the past year. We pulled the top 3 photos with the most likes that depicted travel, omitting those photos and captions that had nothing to do with travel and omitting giveaway incentive posts as outliers. We looked at a grand total of 75 – 80 photos from the Top 23 influencers in the travel space.
From there, the top photos from each influencers were collaged in a photo deck, where our team then assessed repeating colors and shades throughout all influencer content to determine approximately 4 colors and their frequency in the photo set. We look at dimensions such as whether the color was a focal point or a secondary color, how much space the color took up in the photo and how many photos the color appeared in.
Finally, Pantone landed on four official shades and came up with descriptions and color names: Island Paradise, a cleansing aqua(PANTONE 14-4620); Salmon, a coral infused pink (PANTONE 14-1323); Eden, a lush and verdant forest green shade (PANTONE 19-6050); and Brandied Melon, an earthy, russet hue (PANTONE 16-1340).
These have been named the 2018 Colors of Travel, and they’ve been quite a hit already! You can read more about the study (and get inspiration for your own travel photos) from the following publications:
Sunset By The Sea
Looking to for a destination where you can capture all of these colors at once? Carlsbad, California has them all with their sandy beaches, ocean views, colorful attractions, lush floral fields, and green hills. Check out more of the “Colors of Travel” in their natural element at www.colorsofcarlsbad.com.
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