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Nature of Color: Your Field Guide for Exploring Color in the Natural World
Influenced by her classical art training, designer and artist Kimberly Collins Jermain makes color theory simple and understandable for the everyday reader
Color is one of Mother Nature’s most elegant ideas and the most powerful visual tool to inspire human response. After teaching classical art and color theory for over 35 years, Kimberly Collins Jermain believes the visual skills we need to create art and to design interior spaces can be seen and understood best right outside your back door. Nature of Color is a field guide for exploring color theory on hikes, beach walks, while gardening, or when exercising outdoors. Jermain’s simple approach to color theory will train your perceptions and give you the tools you need to solve everyday problems and create with color confidence. Unlike most color theory texts, Nature of Color is an active practice of outdoor adventure. As you joyfully explore and experience color outdoors with Nature of Color, you will understand the importance of keeping nature’s exquisite lessons in mind as we navigate and share our natural world.
Color is one of Mother Nature’s most elegant ideas and the most powerful visual tool to inspire human response. After teaching classical art and color theory for over 35 years, Kimberly Collins Jermain believes the visual skills we need to create art and to design interior spaces can be seen and understood best right outside your back door. Nature of Color is a field guide for exploring color theory on hikes, beach walks, while gardening, or when exercising outdoors. Jermain’s simple approach to color theory will train your perceptions and give you the tools you need to solve everyday problems and create with color confidence. Unlike most color theory texts, Nature of Color is an active practice of outdoor adventure. As you joyfully explore and experience color outdoors with Nature of Color, you will understand the importance of keeping nature’s exquisite lessons in mind as we navigate and share our natural world.
160 pages, Paperback
Published September 2, 2025
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
June 12, 2025
A good exhortation to go outside and witness color in nature. Particularly appreciated the emphasis of hibernation/rest and how our eyes quite literally need to rest or will perceive colors as more gray.
“Local color is the term used to explain the appearance of color that is next to the viewer when describing the concept of color perspective (hue as it appears in three dimension). When we see color next to us, or hold it in our hand as a sample, a common misconception is that the color is static. In reality, color varies with every movement of the light that illuminates the surface of an object.
It also changes in context to everything that is around it: the color of our skin, the clothing we are wearing, or the color of the floor we are standing on. For example, when we look at someone next to us, we will see the person wearing a particular color, but when that person moves farther away, let's say across an expansive lawn, we will see the color of the clothing change because water molecules in the air make the color bluer and grayer and less defined.” 47
“When I ask a new class to tell me a color that they think is one that lives in the background, someone always suggests black. I have come to understand that many have a visceral notion of color that is at a distance to them from their early understanding of color, which signals a hole in the ground or a deep cavity where light is absent. However, as a landscape painter, I seldom use black. Its appearance in a natural setting is startling and artificial. Most often there is too much light outdoors for black to exist.” 72
Thank you netgalley for my ecopy
“Local color is the term used to explain the appearance of color that is next to the viewer when describing the concept of color perspective (hue as it appears in three dimension). When we see color next to us, or hold it in our hand as a sample, a common misconception is that the color is static. In reality, color varies with every movement of the light that illuminates the surface of an object.
It also changes in context to everything that is around it: the color of our skin, the clothing we are wearing, or the color of the floor we are standing on. For example, when we look at someone next to us, we will see the person wearing a particular color, but when that person moves farther away, let's say across an expansive lawn, we will see the color of the clothing change because water molecules in the air make the color bluer and grayer and less defined.” 47
“When I ask a new class to tell me a color that they think is one that lives in the background, someone always suggests black. I have come to understand that many have a visceral notion of color that is at a distance to them from their early understanding of color, which signals a hole in the ground or a deep cavity where light is absent. However, as a landscape painter, I seldom use black. Its appearance in a natural setting is startling and artificial. Most often there is too much light outdoors for black to exist.” 72
Thank you netgalley for my ecopy
September 26, 2025
Nature of Color is a book about the relationship people have with colors, especially colors we can find in nature. The author, Kimberly Collins Jermain is a landscape painter, an educator and a designer (consulting on architectural projects). she uses her vast experience to teach us how to see and use colors.
This is a good book to have with you on a hike. It's actually a field guide with lots exercises to try on a walk in the woods or at the beach, that will teach you to look, to observe and to recreate the colors that you see. It even has space at the back for coloring, note taking and special pages to aid you in completing the exercises.
The book starts by explaining the difference between seeing and perception, focusing on how personal experience and genetics shape the way we look at the world. Color associations with emotions or childhood memories, visits to museums, our homes, our environment, but also: the differences between sexes, our age and even our eye color - they all play a part in our perception.
”Your life history influences your sensory understanding of the natural world.”
The author encourages us to build a visual library and to search with intention for interesting and colorful things, to observe what attracts and what repels us. She tells us about how making an Instagram account for pictures of "found color" helped her see even more wonderful, colorful things and make a mental reference book of color.
An idea that's reiterated in the book is going out on the trail and observing how colors change. They change because of context, light, weather, seasons etc. We tend to perceive color as something static, but "in reality color varies with every moment of the light that illuminates the surface of an object. It also changes in context with everything that is around it: the color of our skin, the clothing we are wearing, or the color of the floor we are standing on.".
A practical exercise you can try is to observe something in nature (a leaf in the forest, a seashell on the beach), document it with a photo or a color sketch and then take it out of it's context (move it in different lighting or add it to your home collection) and see how it changes.
Pay attention to the difference between real color and photographic color. Experiment with your settings to get the closest approximation.
Visiting the same place at different times can work the same way. A garden will look very different in the bright sunlight of summer than on a gloomy rainy day.
Another practical exercise in the book is to make a sundial, choose objects in the colors of the rainbow and arrange them with the cool colors in the North and the warm ones in the South. Observing the sundial during the day will show you how the colors change with the light.
The second part of the book details how colors affect humans. The way a room that's painted red can rise your blood pressure and a blue room can lower it. How yellow and warm sunny colors can help with concentration and alleviate Seasonal Affective Disorder symptoms. The colors that we surround ourselves with affect our life quality in a real, quantifiable way.
When we really look at our environment and our clothes we can discover that we have a pallete of colors that we're naturally drawn to.
In the end the author reminds us about the need for rest. Simple breaks every 20 minutes can help your eyes and your perception of color. And the importance of time taken to meditate, to assimilate, to write down your impressions.
I found the book to be very accessible, especially for beginner or young artists. I liked that the exercises weren't intimidating, they need minimal prep and are easy enough to try.
You can tell that the author is also a teacher, from the easy to follow explanations that always come with examples and personal anecdotes.
The best thing about this book is that it inspired me to get out of the house, to leave my comfort zone and go exploring! I really liked the use of a viewfinder and even made some custom frames that made it easier to focus on a specific object or scene.
This is a good book to have with you on a hike. It's actually a field guide with lots exercises to try on a walk in the woods or at the beach, that will teach you to look, to observe and to recreate the colors that you see. It even has space at the back for coloring, note taking and special pages to aid you in completing the exercises.
The book starts by explaining the difference between seeing and perception, focusing on how personal experience and genetics shape the way we look at the world. Color associations with emotions or childhood memories, visits to museums, our homes, our environment, but also: the differences between sexes, our age and even our eye color - they all play a part in our perception.
”Your life history influences your sensory understanding of the natural world.”
The author encourages us to build a visual library and to search with intention for interesting and colorful things, to observe what attracts and what repels us. She tells us about how making an Instagram account for pictures of "found color" helped her see even more wonderful, colorful things and make a mental reference book of color.
An idea that's reiterated in the book is going out on the trail and observing how colors change. They change because of context, light, weather, seasons etc. We tend to perceive color as something static, but "in reality color varies with every moment of the light that illuminates the surface of an object. It also changes in context with everything that is around it: the color of our skin, the clothing we are wearing, or the color of the floor we are standing on.".
A practical exercise you can try is to observe something in nature (a leaf in the forest, a seashell on the beach), document it with a photo or a color sketch and then take it out of it's context (move it in different lighting or add it to your home collection) and see how it changes.
Pay attention to the difference between real color and photographic color. Experiment with your settings to get the closest approximation.
Visiting the same place at different times can work the same way. A garden will look very different in the bright sunlight of summer than on a gloomy rainy day.
Another practical exercise in the book is to make a sundial, choose objects in the colors of the rainbow and arrange them with the cool colors in the North and the warm ones in the South. Observing the sundial during the day will show you how the colors change with the light.
The second part of the book details how colors affect humans. The way a room that's painted red can rise your blood pressure and a blue room can lower it. How yellow and warm sunny colors can help with concentration and alleviate Seasonal Affective Disorder symptoms. The colors that we surround ourselves with affect our life quality in a real, quantifiable way.
When we really look at our environment and our clothes we can discover that we have a pallete of colors that we're naturally drawn to.
In the end the author reminds us about the need for rest. Simple breaks every 20 minutes can help your eyes and your perception of color. And the importance of time taken to meditate, to assimilate, to write down your impressions.
I found the book to be very accessible, especially for beginner or young artists. I liked that the exercises weren't intimidating, they need minimal prep and are easy enough to try.
You can tell that the author is also a teacher, from the easy to follow explanations that always come with examples and personal anecdotes.
The best thing about this book is that it inspired me to get out of the house, to leave my comfort zone and go exploring! I really liked the use of a viewfinder and even made some custom frames that made it easier to focus on a specific object or scene.
April 17, 2025
Jermain's book "Nature of Colour" is a short field guide on exploring colour in nature. It doesn't explore colour in the traditional sense (explaining the colour wheel and deep-diving into colour theory, only making brief mentions throughout).
While I think that this is an interesting premise and way to go about viewing colour in nature, I'm not sure it necessarily worked for me. As an artist myself, I would have preferred a bit of a deeper dive into how traditional colour theory worked in nature. However that is not this book's fault, that is my own!
I think this book will be perhaps more important for those starting out in their artistic journey or just people who want to view the natural world a little bit differently. Hopefully this works better for some people!
thank you to Netgalley for letting me receive this arc in exchange for an honest review.
While I think that this is an interesting premise and way to go about viewing colour in nature, I'm not sure it necessarily worked for me. As an artist myself, I would have preferred a bit of a deeper dive into how traditional colour theory worked in nature. However that is not this book's fault, that is my own!
I think this book will be perhaps more important for those starting out in their artistic journey or just people who want to view the natural world a little bit differently. Hopefully this works better for some people!
thank you to Netgalley for letting me receive this arc in exchange for an honest review.
June 18, 2025
Publishing date: 02.09.2025 (DD/MM/YYYY)
Thank you to NetGalley and Familius for the ARC. My opinions are my own.
If you, like a lot of the other peeps on the internet, have gotten a sudden fascination with color theory, then this book is for you.
This is a deeper dive into theories and practices than the surface level you can find elsewhere on the internet, but it is genuinely interesting. You also get lots of smaller sections with things you can try out and experiment with to show color theory in practice, and it is very fun. As a "learning through practice" kind of person, thank you author for these sections.
Overall, a fun book. Learned lots, and will be using it in my own art. 4 stars, highly recommend.
Thank you to NetGalley and Familius for the ARC. My opinions are my own.
If you, like a lot of the other peeps on the internet, have gotten a sudden fascination with color theory, then this book is for you.
This is a deeper dive into theories and practices than the surface level you can find elsewhere on the internet, but it is genuinely interesting. You also get lots of smaller sections with things you can try out and experiment with to show color theory in practice, and it is very fun. As a "learning through practice" kind of person, thank you author for these sections.
Overall, a fun book. Learned lots, and will be using it in my own art. 4 stars, highly recommend.
April 19, 2025
I had high expectations of this book. I did not find the exercises helpful. I expected more color paintings to explain the exercises.
I received this galley from NetGalley.
I received this galley from NetGalley.
May 3, 2025
Nice aesthetic and presentation.
High quality images.
Easily digestible.
Includes thoughtful prompts for reflection.
Will be of interest for the right audience.
For some, myself included, this felt geared towards beginners-- those who may not have spent much time considering connections of color before. Those new to the subject matter may find the material particularly eye-opening and worthwhile.
High quality images.
Easily digestible.
Includes thoughtful prompts for reflection.
Will be of interest for the right audience.
For some, myself included, this felt geared towards beginners-- those who may not have spent much time considering connections of color before. Those new to the subject matter may find the material particularly eye-opening and worthwhile.
September 3, 2025
3.5 ⭐ - This book emphasises taking inspiration from the natural world around us, and to become more attentive to understanding the dynamics of colors. I love understanding the psychology or science behind natural phenomenon and how it influences us. I enjoyed the parts through the story that focused on painting, nature, culture and our perceptions from that angle.
I found the point on how memory informs our real-time perception interesting, and the fact that we need to seek out nature more actively, as we are mostly conditioned to built-in environement. There is much to to be said about the joy of discovery through curiosity in nature and how it can inspire creativity.
There were a lot of specific instructions to do with hiking, surroundings, what to wear, what supplies to use, how to carry them etc. I didn't find these relevant to what my interest was in reading and the kind of painting I do. While I love painting nature, I haven't often done so plein air. There were many practical exeercises, but I skipped over reading those as my focus wasn't on using this as a workbook. Some parts also felt a bit repetitive.
I would say this book was focused on the artists personal journey, experiences, specifically with hiking and outdoor painting along with some workbook like exercises. If you are interested in these things primarily, you will find the book much more useful!
Personally, I would have enjoyed the book more if it had been focused on nature and color in a thematic way.
Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the e-arc of this story. I received it for free, and I'm voluntarily leaving my honest thoughts and opinions in this review.
I found the point on how memory informs our real-time perception interesting, and the fact that we need to seek out nature more actively, as we are mostly conditioned to built-in environement. There is much to to be said about the joy of discovery through curiosity in nature and how it can inspire creativity.
There were a lot of specific instructions to do with hiking, surroundings, what to wear, what supplies to use, how to carry them etc. I didn't find these relevant to what my interest was in reading and the kind of painting I do. While I love painting nature, I haven't often done so plein air. There were many practical exeercises, but I skipped over reading those as my focus wasn't on using this as a workbook. Some parts also felt a bit repetitive.
I would say this book was focused on the artists personal journey, experiences, specifically with hiking and outdoor painting along with some workbook like exercises. If you are interested in these things primarily, you will find the book much more useful!
Personally, I would have enjoyed the book more if it had been focused on nature and color in a thematic way.
Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the e-arc of this story. I received it for free, and I'm voluntarily leaving my honest thoughts and opinions in this review.
July 17, 2025
This book is unlike one I've ever come across for color theory or something in that arena. This book is not a red + blue = purple. This book is more of an exploration into how to translate what you see into actual colors. There are exercises to practice translating what you see into colorful landscapes and natural beauty. It is immersive and honestly an interesting angle on dissecting the intricate details of color that you might not have noticed before. This book will teach you to question what you see at face value. It's honestly fascinating. I suggest this for artists and those that work with color to enhance your perception of what you are really trying to capture. Thank you to Kimberly Collins Jermain, Familius, and NetGalley for the ARC.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews