The British Colour Council (BCC) was an industry standards organisation, active from the 1930s to the 1950s, which produced indexes of named colours for use by government, industry, academia, and horticulture.

1930s

Founded in 1931 and chaired by designer Robert Francis Wilson, the BCC produced the British Colour Council reference Code or British Colour Codes: indexes of named colours for a variety of industries.

"Dictionary of Colour Standards"

Its first major work was the British Colour Council 1934 "Dictionary of Colour Standards" which defined colour shades in its printed plates and gave a two or three number code and evocative names to each colour. BCC colour codes define colours as varying by hue

Hue

Hue is one of the main properties of a color, defined technically , as "the degree to which a stimulus can be describedas similar to or different from stimuli that are described as red, green, blue, and yellow,"...

, tone

Lightness (color)

Lightness is a property of a color, or a dimension of a color space, that is defined in a way to reflect the subjective brightness perception of a color for humans along a lightness–darkness axis. A color's lightness also corresponds to its amplitude.Various color models have an explicit term for...

 and intensity, and were originally designed for use in the textile

Textile

A textile or cloth is a flexible woven material consisting of a network of natural or artificial fibres often referred to as thread or yarn. Yarn is produced by spinning raw fibres of wool, flax, cotton, or other material to produce long strands...

 dye

Dye

A dye is a colored substance that has an affinity to the substrate to which it is being applied. The dye is generally applied in an aqueous solution, and requires a mordant to improve the fastness of the dye on the fiber....

 industry. The colour names given by the BCC were particularly descriptive and often referred to flora or fauna, with titles such as Larkspur ("No. 196"), Forget-Me-Not ("No. 84"), Bee Eater Blue, Kermes, and Squirrel. The codes of the BCC became standards for identifying colours used in everything from the Royal Horticultural Society

Royal Horticultural Society

The Royal Horticultural Society was founded in 1804 in London, England as the Horticultural Society of London, and gained its present name in a Royal Charter granted in 1861 by Prince Albert...

, to British government planning commission maps, the British Army

British Army

The British Army is the land warfare branch of Her Majesty's Armed Forces in the United Kingdom. It came into being with the unification of the Kingdom of England and Scotland into the Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707. The new British Army incorporated Regiments that had already existed in England...

, Royal Institute of British Architects

Royal Institute of British Architects

The Royal Institute of British Architects is a professional body for architects primarily in the United Kingdom, but also internationally.-History:...

, and the Royal Mail

Royal Mail

Royal Mail is the government-owned postal service in the United Kingdom. Royal Mail Holdings plc owns Royal Mail Group Limited, which in turn operates the brands Royal Mail and Parcelforce Worldwide...

. BCC codes, due to their subtlety of hue in comparison with previous standards, were useful for the precise colour matching necessary in fields as diverse as dermatology

Dermatology

Dermatology is the branch of medicine dealing with the skin and its diseases, a unique specialty with both medical and surgical aspects. A dermatologist takes care of diseases, in the widest sense, and some cosmetic problems of the skin, scalp, hair, and nails....

 and the classification of Chinese

People's Republic of China

China , officially the People's Republic of China , is the most populous country in the world, with over 1.3 billion citizens. Located in East Asia, the country covers approximately 9.6 million square kilometres...

 porcelain

Porcelain

Porcelain is a ceramic material made by heating raw materials, generally including clay in the form of kaolin, in a kiln to temperatures between and...

.

Horticulture

In the late 1930s the BCC produced books for use in horticulture

Horticulture

Horticulture is the industry and science of plant cultivation including the process of preparing soil for the planting of seeds, tubers, or cuttings. Horticulturists work and conduct research in the disciplines of plant propagation and cultivation, crop production, plant breeding and genetic...

. Its first (1938) version included 200 named hues, printed as 3 lightnesses each for a total of 600 colours, each given distinctive names; later editions included 4 tins per hue, making a total of 800 colours.

"British Colours"

The BCC also advised the 1937 royal coronation, providing "Traditional British Colours" for flags and street decorations.

Postwar

The BCC, under Chairmanship of British lighting industry executive Leslie Hubble, continued to publish colour codes through the 1960s, and while largely supplanted by the British Standards

British Standards

British Standards are the standards produced by BSI Group which is incorporated under a Royal Charter...

 organisation, and commercial colour standards such as Pantone

Pantone

Pantone Inc. is a corporation headquartered in Carlstadt, New Jersey, USA. The company is best known for its Pantone Matching System , a proprietary color space...

, the BCC codes are still referred to by industries in the United Kingdom

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

 and used as standards for some British Commonwealth flags, academic robes and horticulture.

Establishments

The council, as well as functioning as an oversight body, operated a reference publishing house and its British Colour Education Institute, after the Second World War at 13 Portman Square, London, W1, and later at 10A Chandos St, W1M 9DE.

Selected BCC publications

• BRITISH COLOUR COUNCIL & WILSON, Robert F. Dictionary of Colour Standards: Adopted by the British Standards Institution as British standard no.543-1934. 2 volumes. +240 silk colour samples. London, BCC (1934).
• BRITISH COLOUR COUNCIL. Bunting Colours. London, BCC (1936).
• BRITISH COLOUR COUNCIL, THE HORTICULTURAL COLOUR CHART. 2 volumes. London, BCC in collaboration with Royal Horticultural Society. (1938–1941).
• BRITISH COLOUR COUNCIL & WILSON, Robert F. Colour and Lighting in Factories and Offices. 2 volumes. London, BCC (1946).
• BRITISH COLOUR COUNCIL. Colour-chart: Survey & Planning. London, BCC (1946).
• BRITISH COLOUR COUNCIL. For the Co-ordination of Colour and Design. London, BCC (1947).
• BRITISH COLOUR COUNCIL, WILSON, Robert F. & MITCHELL, Audrey M. Dictionary of Colours for Interior Decoration. 3 volumes. 378 samples in gloss, matt & pile. London, BCC (1949).
• BRITISH COLOUR COUNCIL, WILSON, Robert F. & MITCHELL, Audrey M. Dictionary of Colour Standards +240 dyed woollen samples. London, BCC (1951).
• BRITISH COLOUR COUNCIL, Institute of Vitreous Enamellers. Colours for Vitreous Enamels. London, BCC (1951).
• BRITISH COLOUR COUNCIL. Machinery Colours, Safety Colour Code, Pipe Identification Colours. London, BCC (1951).
• BRITISH COLOUR COUNCIL. The British Colour Council’s Seventh Designer’s Conference. The Rose as a Theme for Design. London, BCC (1952).
• BRITISH COLOUR COUNCIL, H. H. Muirhead. Colour. London, BCC (1966).