Color of the Year Focus: Children’s Learning Center

Dunn-Edwards® 2020 Color of the Year, Minty Fresh (DE5687), captures the enthusiasm and optimism of a new decade. As a key color of the Dunn-Edwards 2020 Color Trends story, “Fresh and Free,” Minty Fresh exudes a calm, clean and crisp high point to the color palette, a subtle and relaxing pastel that conveys the partnership between technology and nature. Applying this color in design seeks to create measured rhythm out of chaos, with health and wellness at a central place in design planning. Scandinavian design studio Native Narrative designed this Children’s Learning Center in the village of Danhug featuring and celebrating the color Minty Fresh.

The Native Narrative project functions as an after-school facility during weekdays and weekends, as well as a safe meeting spot for children in emergency. As the Philippines is one of the most disaster-prone countries in the world based on the world risk index, the country is highly vulnerable to typhoons, earthquakes and floods. The structure, made of reinforced concrete with hollow block walls and a lightweight metal roof, comprises a symmetric column layout that enhances the building’s resiliency to these natural disasters.

All furniture is made of plywood by local carpenters, while the bespoke woven seating-covers are made of pandan, a grass grown, dried, dyed and woven by a local collective of weavers. The minimal Minty Fresh color palette helps reduce the environment to a backdrop in which children, books and toys stand out, blending into the surrounding vegetation.

All images used with permission