Public Colour Workshops for Design Professionals

Unlock the potential of colour

What You Should’ve Been Taught at University

Architects are acutely aware that colour is “everywhere, all at one, all the time”.

Colour is the means by which architecture is seen, and space is understood.

However, most colour training and architecture courses teach little or no colour theory at all. If they do, they focus on colour theory in 2 dimensions, or they teach colour psychology in a formulaic way, making architects even more colour averse.

Spatial designers need colour training attuned to architectural thinking. Lymesmith’s workshops focus on unlocking the potential of colour in the design of complex three-dimensional environments.

Designed for architects and built-environment designers, my group workshops teach the colour design foundations every architect and spatial designer needs to know. I don’t teach colour psychology, or the history of the colour wheel, which any decent book on colour can offer you.

I teach you about the application of colour for real world, large scale, complex built environments. I teach Architectural Colour Design.

What is Architectural Colour Design?

I define good colour design as ‘colour selection and arrangement that is in service to the architecture, and to the people who will use the architecture’.

While most people have colours they love and those they’d prefer to avoid - good spatial colour design is not about individual colours at all. It’s about relationships between the colours, and the strategies used to determine the placement of those colours.

Good colour design may be very understated, hardly registering as ‘coloured’ at all. Conversely, colour may be a building’s most dominant and memorable characteristic, or it can be anywhere in between these two extremes.

Good Colour Design

Intelligent colour design is the artful combination of colour selection, colour strategy and architectural style.

Intelligent colour design;

  • makes buildings better for people

  • creates engaging, place-sensitive environments for human well-being and user engagement

  • connects interiors to landscapes

  • is about colour relationships not individual colours

  • is Architectural Colour Design.

Intelligent Colour Design

Upcoming Colour Workshops & Webinars

We have a series of upcoming workshops designed to help architects and designers deepen their understanding of colour, build practical skills, and explore new ways of shaping space through colour.

  • The Role of Colour in Trauma Informed Design

    Date: 2 December 2025

    Time: 5:00 - 6:00pm (AEDT)

    Venue: Online via Zoom

    $59 +gst

    Learn more

  • It's Not Black and White

    Date: 10 February 2026

    Time: 12:30-1:30pm (AEDT)

    Venue: Online via Zoom

    $85 +gst

    Learn more

I hold in-person colour workshops across Australia

Subscribe to my mailing list to hear once new colour workshop dates are released.

Register for upcoming colour workshops

  • "Colour in architecture – a means as powerful as the ground plan and section."

    Le Corbusier

  • There's a significant gap between what architects are taught about colour at university and what they feel they ought to know in practice.

    Study by Deakin University + University of Melbourne , 2015

  • "Architects aren’t taught about bio-responses to colour. They’re not taught how they can move volumes around in space through the application of colour, or how they can use colour to shape experience and behaviour."

    Jill Pilaroscia

  • "Let’s stop slapping on colour as an afterthought. Let’s shed our macho nostalgia for the white cube and let’s start thinking strategically and integrally about colour. The world will thank us."

    Joanna Day | Langstaff Day Architects

Access Colour Webinar recordings

My past webinars are available as on-demand recordings.

  • The Threat of Colour

    Recording Now Available - $59 + GST

    Originally presented online via Zoom on 12 August 2025

    Learn more

  • Don't Look Up! Do Ceilings Have To Be So Ugly?

    Recording Now Available - $59 + GST

    Originally presented online via Zoom on 7 October 2025

    Learn more

About me,
sonia van de haar

Hello, I’m Sonia!

I am passionate about the potential of intelligent colour design to create a built environment that connects people to place and enhances human well-being.

My qualifications in architecture and fine arts gives me a unique insight into colour design that is attuned to the particular needs and concerns of architects.

I love helping my clients to unlock the potential of colour and material to transform buildings and create memorable places. I work with a cross section of design professionals, from sole practitioners to medium sized firms to developers and private clients, on all scales of projects in the built environment.

In 2023 I began teaching my award-winning colour design methodology to architects and spatial designers.

  • “I’ve just attended Lymesmith’s Colour Workshop in Hobart. It was fantastic and eye opening! Sonia’s use of real examples from her own work as well as global and local precedents was really inspiring and helped me to understand the colour theory and principles that she was describing. It’s given me more confidence in talking about colour to clients.”

    Emily Taylor, Core Collective Architects

  • “Your work embeds a layer of storytelling and artistic expression into the architectural expression, thereby creating a greater depth of meaning. The outcome provides multiple layers through which the end user can interact with the building."

    Gabrielle Pelletier, Sam Crawford Architects

  • “Sonia prepared a beautiful colour scheme where, rather than using one colour, she proposed 4 different greens to improve the restaurant’s spatial qualities and create depth and interest. It was such a wonderful experience working with Sonia. She made a good scheme into something really special.”

    Phillip Arnold, Plus Minus Design

  • “Sonia, your philosophy and theories on colour are game changing and I can’t wait to learn more”.

    Michelle Lee, Architect, Sydney

  • “I have worked with Sonia for some time now and I admire her confident and bold approach to architecture. Sonia pushes the envelope – always thinking outside the box - and continually helps me to do the same."

    Emili Fox, Architectus

  • “Colour is rarely discussed, so it was wonderful to gain an insight into the Lymesmith process. It was great to play with a real example and see the actual built results... It was an inspiring course, and I was excited to get out my coloured pencils after leaving them all alone for so many years! Thank you, Sonia.”

    Karryn Dargie, In-Teria Architects, Tasmania

  • "The course gave a language to the way we have already been using colour in our work without realising it, as well as presented the ways to develop it further. It also introduced other strategies that could be used when thinking about applying colour in architecture."

    Vesna Trobec, Studio Trobec

  • "I love that I'll now be able to consider colour as another layer / design strategy to inform and connect to place. I'm really looking forward to integrating this knowledge to see how colour can be used as intrinsic to the spatial qualities of a design. Thank you for sharing your knowledge!"

    Charmaine Pang, Charmaine Pang Architect

earn cpd points

All Lymesmith workshops and webinars qualify as professional development training and can be claimed as a tax-deductible business expense.

  • Workshops: Each workshop currently provides 3 formal CPD points.

  • Webinars: Webinars provide 1 informal CPD point.

Lymesmith’s training is designed to support your creative growth, and your professional obligations.

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Discover how Lymesmith's design method naturally leads to better colour communication by outlining the key skills you need to weave a colour story your clients will love.

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