14. Gaskin

The name of today’s colour comes from the Scots word for “a rough green gooseberry”. I don’t have a gooseberry to hand, but perhaps the dark star of green around the seeded centre of a kiwi speaks to this vivid, grassy green.

In my mind, all the bright greens have faded to yellow or brown towards the close of this year. But an adventure with Gaskin in hand disabuses me of this notion. Here and there are sheltered patches of grass, as green and Gaskiny now as at the height of spring!

There is a succulent seaside plant whose name I don’t know, that grows along beside the beach. It seems incredibly hardy and has retained its green colour even into December.

I find the greens especially difficult to photograph, how about you?

The balance of colours within each green seems so specific – so easy to misjudge the yellow undertones in a green, to miss how blue a shade is, to mistake a close-ish match for a perfect one. And reflections. The soft, mohair-haloed yarn is so different in how it reflects light to the stout, fleshy, living, shiny, spiky, unruly and various textures of the living world.

There is a kind of mallow that grows on the beach here that seems to love Gaskin…

…the stout, ribbed leaves of plantain are quite a good match, too…

…and, spiky like a Gooseberry bush, this gorse seems a good match.

As I wander from plant to plant with this ball in hand, measuring the match between each leaf type and this yarn, I realise I could spend months with the greens from this advent calendar in hand – Gaskin, Stockiemuir and Garth – debating which plants are which colour. And still not end up with definitive answers!

Gaskin also leads me to some tarps. Covering a collection of fishing gear and protecting it from rain, these greens – like those of the coastal plants that surround me as I take these photos – are also rich and various.

These net weights – at least I think they are net weights – speak to the colour of Gaskin, too…

…like little manmade gooseberries, rough and green and sturdy, and ready for their work at sea.

What a reminder that we can find green – even this living, vibrant shade – as much in the built environment as in leaves and stems.

What joy to find that the winter has not browned and greyed out my local landscape as much as I’d imagined was the case. In these grey days, the little bursts of green are like a salve.

What vivid green joy has Gaskin led you to?

These posts coincide with the KDD & Co. Colour Compass advent calendars. Each day, throughout December I’ll be opening my calendar beside you, and exploring the yarn shade that is revealed for that day. Read more about these posts here, and prepare for a few weeks of polychromatic fun as we discover the shades together and revel in their suggestive associations and creative possibilities together! Even if you don’t have a calendar, I hope you’ll love exploring colours with me, and thinking about each shade as it appears, and how it is connected with the everyday colours of your life.