Colours: Why Have Some Colours Become Gender Specific?

Published : February 18, 2010 :: 17:02:40 [ 1,790 views ]

I came across an article the other day on assigning colour to gender. Apparently this is an early 20th century trait. It seems, that at one time the colour associations were reversed with boys wearing pink and girls wearing blue and what we considered as normal, in years gone by, it was considered conventional.

Pink was once considered more of a boys colour, as it was thought of as a watered down colour of red which was considered a fierce colour, bold and dramatic whilst pale blue was more for girls because it was considered delicate and dainty.

A newspaper from 1914 advised mothers to use pink for boys and blue for girls if they were a follower of convention, with “The Sunday Sentinel, March 29th 1914” saying, “There has been a great diversity of opinion on the subject, but the generally accepted rule is pink for boys and blue for girls. The reason for this is pink being a more decided and stronger colour is more suitable for the boy, while blue, which is more delicate and dainty is prettier for the girl.”

In the US, the current pink for girls and blue for boys wasn’t used until the 1950’s.

Apparently Germany also had an association of pink with femininity. Catholic traditions in Germany and surrounding countries reverse the current colour coding, with the strong association of blue with the Virgin Mary. The German choice of pink suggests that it was associated with girls by the 1930’s

It was not until WWII that colours were reversed and pink became a girl’s colour.

While there are myths and legends supporting both or either colour for gender identification, resources dealing with straight history date the identification of pink with femininity to the period of World War II or later.