Turning the table on color

Yellow and orange, purple and turquoise and especially green - there are more colors available in this year's early china collections than ever before.

There's also a counter trend - no color at all expressed in white china and glass that is very unpretentious, but not exactly plain. The two trends don't cancel each other out. On the contrary, the right combination of white and colors or modern and old, can really show the pieces' cachet.

This was obvious at a recent interior design show in Frankfurt. The trends for 2008 combine opposites, such as nature and high tech or luxury and abstention, according to the show's organizers. The essential elements are modernity and clarity. Despite the many intense colors, the overall picture appears calm compared with that of past years mainly because designers have foregone patterns.