What is your favorite color? The question may remind you of a teenage scrapbook, but each color has a story that reaches deep into history. Historian Michèle Pastoureau examines in this book the history of the favorite color of the West. Blue.

From turquoise to deep navy blue, the omnipresence of this color is primarily expressed in the clothes we wear, from work overalls to beloved jeans. However, blue has not always held this position in our societies. The ancient Greeks and Romans despised it, considering it a barbaric color; in some cases, it seems they didn’t even see it at all.

So how did we arrive at the mythical blue of Vermeer and royal blue? Are we rebels or conformists when we spontaneously answer that our favorite color is blue? This book will make you see colors in a new light.

Michèle Pastoureau's work narrates the story of this transformation, emphasizing the social practices of color (vocabulary, fabrics and garments, daily life, symbols) and its place in literary and artistic creation, from ancient and medieval societies to modern times. It also highlights the triumph of blue in the contemporary era, assesses its uses and meanings, and ponders its future.