US colour management technology firm Datacolor is partnering with textile colour specialist Color Solutions International (CSI) to improve textile colour identification for fashion and apparel brands. The move pairs Datacolor’s ColorReaderPro portable colour measurement device with the ColorWall from CSI, enabling firms to precisely select and identify colour from multiple colour libraries. In addition, the ability to add a brand’s own colours on the ColorReaderPro “offers tremendous time and cost savings to the textile industry by eliminating the need to manually search and match textile colour samples with swatches or colour codes,” the companies say. “Speed to market remains a driving influence upon the fashion and apparel industry, making it essential that brands spend less and less time on colour development and matching,” explains Tim Williams, Marketing Manager at CSI, which is a division of dye manufacturer DyStar.
“Through this partnership, we’re answering our customers’ call for a solution allowing them to easily and quickly select existing colours in their library or to choose a colour from our 3,700+ ColorWall during the colour palette creation process. Thanks to the compact, simple-to-use ColorReaderPro, industry professionals will dramatically speed up their seasonal colour palette development process.” The solution allows brands to accelerate palette creation, reduce the cost of colour development and ensure colour quality and evaluation throughout the supply chain using the hand-held, Bluetooth-connected ColorReaderPro tool. “We are excited to debut this solution with our long-time partners at CSI and offer the textile industry yet another innovative colour management solution,” says Dustin Bowersox, Textile Marketing Manager for Datacolor. “With the simple push of a button, designers can now match any colour to the closest CSI colour standard, or their existing custom colour library, effectively eliminating the need for manual colour look-up.” The portable ColorReaderPro “lets users capture and quickly share inspiration colours and associated palettes while improving component matching with on-the-go colour pass/fail checks.”
