Central Institute for Design, Berlin [Zentralinstitut für Gestaltung ZfG]

The complex design of the work environment was a major focus of East Germany’s Central Institute for Design (until 1965 Zentralinstitut für Formgestaltung) a predecessor of the Office for Industrial Design (Amt für industrielle Formgestaltung, or AiF).
In this context, the colour design of space, workplaces, equipment, and production facilities was closely studied by the ZfG (and later the AiF) and propagated across the country. The ‘Farbenkatalog für die Gestaltung’ (Colour catalogue for design) developed by Lothar Gericke (b. 1937), Klaus Schöne, Rotraut Schumitz (b. 1940, mar. Pohl), Otto Richter, and others, was a practical guide matching the given reality: using the twelve standard colours offered by East Germany’s paint industry, 485 new colour tones were created. Numbered colour sample cards with detailed mixing ratios facilitated shared understandings as well as the systematic application of colour in environmental and product design. This was also the basis for other highly regarded publications, including ‘The Phenomenon of colour’, which was first published in 1970.