Architectural colour; a discourse in the popular Norwegian press and social media 2014 to 2016. The greying of Norway. ISBN 978-5-88018-433-0

This article examines the role of visual and verbal rhetoric that project the power relationships in the drift towards achromatic colour schemes in new architectural projects and the repainting of the surface colour of existing buildings that fall outside heritage regulations in Norway. This is examined through media debate to expose the power relations of cultural capital (Bourdieu 1986) in the rhetoric used by the stakeholders, ranging from householders to architects, heritage experts, local authorities, colour designers, and developers, and as mediated through journalism. It considers the relationships between agents in the exercise of cultural capital and trend instigation in social physics. It asks how the drift towards the achromatic is mediated, and if this is the influence of the cultural capital of decision makers, an accumulative tipping point (Granovetter 1978) that leads to a change or the absence of resistance due to lack of disciplinary knowledge in the complexities of colour in the professions that are responsible for the application of colour in public space. Standpoints taken by key participants as articulated in the media have been analyzed to examine hierarchical roles and establish a clearer understanding of the mechanisms though which this change takes place. The authors will argue that the achromatic palette is now the standard norm driven by the paint producers’ power position in trend-setting methods and the rapid dissemination processes afforded by digital and social media.