Orange Punch

I’m singing in the leaves…

For the Dutch, orange is associated with the royal family, and is also their national colour. In Hinduism, orange – a deep shade like saffron – is a significant colour, regularly worn in religious ceremonies. And the Irish associate it with unionists, sporting it on their flag for this reason.

Not surprisingly, the colour is named after the fruit of the same name. The first recorded use of it was in 1512, in the court of King Henry VIII. Before that, it was referred to as yellow-red in the English-speaking world. The word was introduced from the French, by way of old Arabic and Persian. In 1839 ‘orange peel’ was first used to describe this exact shade of orange, and less than a hundred years later, in 1915, ‘burnt orange’ made its appearance.

For me, orange is autumn, with skies full of fallen, golden leaves. I own one particularly cosy wool bomber jacket in vivid orange, and it comes out of hiding with the first true cold snap late in the season.

I love burnt orange, but it’s a colour that is not often seen in clothing. When I’ve chanced across it in the past, I have snapped it up: here I wear a silk blouse by Veronica Maine, a silk skirt by Hannii, and orange patent peeptoes by Aldo. The orange umbrella is vintage, found on Etsy, and the fragile scarf sewn with olive, teal and violet ‘leaves’ I found years ago in the Olga Berg warehouse.

I’m still waiting for enough leaves to fall so I can kick up my heels!

(Don’t forget to check out additional images in the Out-takes & Extras gallery.)