In 1963, an American chemistry graduate named Lawrence Herbert devised a system to standardize color, specifying the exact ink formula for every shade. This way, despite changing light and other physical circumstances, each color’s number would ensure that it was the same, everywhere—made according to a consistent recipe.

Through this system, graphic designers, fashion designers, interior decorators, and architects can now specify this deep dark blue—and not that navy blue—and know they’re talking about the same thing. Herbert’s system became the basis for the company he founded: Pantone (meaning “all colors” combining the words “pan” and “tone”).

Color standardization is now critical in a globalized world, where consistency is a must for big brands and color enmeshed with brand identity. Coca-Cola’s red (originally Pantone 484) is its signature, as is pine green (Pantone 3298) for Starbucks.

Pantone

“We’re a technical product and we help designers and the people producing that product link their communication,” says Ron Potesky, Pantone’s senior vice president and general manager. “So when you pick the right color, you get the right color in the end. That’s the core of who we are.”

The Pantone chip itself began appearing on objects after the company published a series of ads during New York Fashion Week. “It was a great ad campaign where we put Pantone chips on designers’ noses. [It was] in bus stops, at the convention center ...” explains Potesky.

Now in addition to all the Pantone-branded objects sold in museum gift shops and lifestyle stores, there’s even a Pantone-themed boutique hotel in Brussels, which offers tea packets, sachets of shampoo, and walls made to resemble Pantone chips and a pop-up Pantone café in Monaco that served food by color. None of these are actually produced by Pantone, but licensed to various companies through a program called “Pantone Universe.”

“The application goes from obscure to pretty elevated,” notes Potesky. “[Pantone Universe] is a halo of effect on a brand that’s a lot of fun. I think it surprised a lot of us how much Pantone caught on as a branding element.”

Among their most unique and profitable items is a line of Pantone Universe hospital scrubs in Japan. Hospital workers wear different Pantone-approved color scrubs every day to help patients languishing in long term care recognize what day it is, Potesky explains.

Pantone

These days, being memed is perhaps the ultimate affirmation of a brand’s icon status, and Pantone has seen plenty of that.

Among the notables are 2012’s Humanæ, in which the Brazilian photographer Angélica Dass mapped the chromatic range of human skin tones according to the Pantone colors system. That same year, for Queen Elizabeth’s Diamond Jubilee, the U.K. office of the advertising agency Leo Burnett created a Pantone color wheel on the British monarch’s famous color-matched outfits.

For Panto’N’Roll, the French design studio Chic & Artistic replaced the colors named in pop anthems with Pantone chips. The Beatles’ The Yellow Submarine was switched to “Pantone 129C Submarine” and Elvis Presley’s 1956 anthem became “Pantone 299C Suede Shoes.”

Chic & Artistic

The recent Instagram project Pantone Smoothies displays photos of raw ingredients pre- and post-puree, to produce smoothies that match existing Pantone numbers (likely with a smidgen of Photoshop magic).

Pantone chips also have inspired manicures, bakery goods, and even Halloween costumes.