Kuala Lumpur, 8 October 2010 - In a colourful spectacle of dance, and pizzazz, AkzoNobel, the world's largest paintings and coatings company and manufacturer of Dulux paints, today unveiled a 'light, airy, citrus yellow' as the highly anticipated Colour of the Year 2011 along with next year's top five colour trends at its annual ColourFutures™ showcase here today. Held at the Carcosa Seri Negara, architects, interior designers and industry experts all gathered to be amongst the privileged few to witness the launch.

"AkzoNobel is the world's largest global paints and coatings company and, as such, colour is extremely important to us," said Marjorie Garrovillo, Marketing Director, AkzoNobel Decorative Paints, South East Asia & Pacific "At AkzoNobel Decorative Paints, we believe in 'Adding Colour to People's Lives' by inspiring and enabling people around the world to decorate more easily and more often. We pride ourselves on our knowledge of colour and design and want to help our customers, consumers, and the communities in which we work realize the uplifting effect that colour can have on their spirits."

ColourFutures™ is the result of ongoing international colour trend research, developed by AkzoNobel's Aesthetic Center with an international group of creative experts from the fields of colour, design, architecture, and fashion, all with their fingers on the pulse of what is happening in trends and colour, to discuss and decide which ideas and colours will be key for the following year. These experts represent different parts of the world such as South East Asia, India, USA/Cananda, South America, South Africa and all regions of Europe. They draw on a variety of national and international sources form fine art to technology, design to nature, architecture to fashion and music to popular culture.

ColourFutures™ provides readers with global style and design trends and influences which are subsequently translated into colour palettes for us around the world. Their views and insights about trends and colour palettes are captured one year in advance in ColourFutures™. These insights cover the most important influences and upcoming new directions in order to keep consumers up-to-date with the latest trends.

"As one of the leading experts on colour, we are very proud to spearhead this inspiring process year after year," said CW Goh, Managing Director, ICI Paints Malaysia Sdn. Bhd. "At AkzoNobel, we pride ourselves on adding colour to people's lives. We do not necessarily refer to colour as mere aesthetics because colours are able to achieve much more than that; behind every colour and tone lies an emotion that is able to impact and transform lives."

Themed 'Appreciation', experts from around the world have deemed that 2011 will see moods reflecting confident yet relaxed trends springing forth from a realization and acceptance of the true and lasting pleasure in life's simple things. The five colour trends for 2011 include "The Beauty of Everyday Life", "Finding the Way", "Pop up Pleasure", "Made with Love", and "Molecular Magic".

While 2010's 'Reclaim' theme concentrated on establishing a sense of balance and honesty to life, 'Appreciation' explores the desire and need to return to a style that focuses on loving the things around us. "In many ways, we are celebrating the acceptance and appreciation for what we have under our noses, instead of always being seduced by the exotic or the far away," added Garrovillo. "The most important thing in life is to love and appreciate what you have. Even as commentators have called ours an individualistic society - we continue to rediscover the beauty of every day life through simple pleasures and everyday inspirations, and begin to find for ourselves a renewed feeling of optimism and a sense of community – one that is hopeful and forward thinking in the year ahead."

"In keeping with the overall theme of 'Appreciation', the Colour of the Year symbolises a freer spirit, sense of fun and positive energy. This clear, clean and translucent citrus yellow encapsulates a mood of hope and optimism for the future," she added.

ColourFutures™ comes at the end of AkzoNobel's Global Color Week programme, which celebrates the wonders of colour as a philosophy and inspiration amongst employees and their families across its offices worldwide. "In many ways, colours represent a way of life; our palette can either have vibrant, colourful lives or dull, unfulfilling lives. Our life's masterpiece will be what we make of it, and at AkzoNobel, we strive to advocate the best colours that life can offer, and even as we continue to be inspired to transform our living spaces, hopefully we too can make that small difference in our communities." added Goh.