The Colourist Online – Welcome to Our Latest Company Member
Welcome to Our Latest Company Member
Connecting Colour Communities: Why X-Rite Joined the SDC
In today’s fast-paced textile and fashion industries, colour remains one of the most powerful tools for storytelling, brand identity, and consumer connection. At X-Rite, we’ve spent decades developing technologies that help brands and suppliers speak the same colour language accurately, consistently, and sustainably.
But we also know that technology alone isn’t enough. That’s why we’ve joined the Society of Dyers and Colourists (SDC) to be part of a community that values education, collaboration, and the advancement of colour science.
A Shared Mission
The SDC’s commitment to knowledge-sharing and professional development resonates deeply with our own values. Whether it’s through webinars, student outreach, or industry events, we see the SDC as a space where colour professionals can come together to explore new ideas and tackle shared challenges.
Our decision to become a Company Member wasn’t about promotion, it was about participation. We wanted to contribute to conversations around digital transformation, sustainability, and the evolving role of colour in global supply chains.
Supporting Brands and Suppliers
One area we’re particularly passionate about is helping brands and suppliers work more efficiently together. Colour approval cycles are often slow, subjective, and resource intensive. Our Textile Color Hub was designed to address this.
It’s a cloud-based platform that allows brands to create digital colour specifications, including spectral data, tolerances, and illuminants, and share them instantly with suppliers. This reduces the need for physical samples and speeds up approvals, helping teams move from concept to shelf faster and with less waste.
✳️ Textile Color Hub in Action
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Up to 95% first-time lab dip accuracy
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Zero physical samples
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75% faster time to market
Learn how Textile Colour Hub helps brands digitally communicate brand colours without shipping physical samples and suppliers achieve 95% of lab dips the first time.
Tools That Support the Process
We’ve also developed tools that support colour measurement and visualization across materials and surfaces:
🧪 Benchtop Spectrophotometers – Ci7000 Series
Reliable, high-precision instruments for measuring colour on textiles, plastics, and coated materials.
The Ci7000 series of benchtop sphere spectrophotometers manages, measures and communicates colour, and delivers repeatable performance.
🌈 MA-T12 Multi-Angle Spectrophotometer
Ideal for capturing colour on complex surfaces like metallics and textured fabrics.
The MA-T12, a multi-angle spectrophotometer with 12 angles of measurement, enables complete characterization of today’s extreme effect materials.
🖥️ PANTORA for Confident Textile Selection
Selecting the right textile, whether for fashion, interiors, or technical applications, has traditionally relied on physical samples, swatches, and lab dips. But with growing pressure to reduce waste and accelerate timelines, many teams are exploring digital alternatives.
PANTORA offers a virtual environment where designers, developers, and suppliers can view and compare colour and texture combinations in high fidelity before a single sample is produced. By integrating spectral data with realistic material visualization, PANTORA helps teams make informed decisions earlier in the process, reducing the need for physical iterations and improving alignment across the supply chain.
It’s not about replacing the tactile experience entirely but about enhancing it with digital confidence, especially when speed, sustainability, and global collaboration are key.
The PANTORA desktop application enables users to capture, store, manage, view and edit virtual materials and digitally exchange them via a vendor neutral Appearance Exchange (AxF) file format.
Bringing Colour Data to Life
For brands with proprietary colour standards, our PantoneLIVE Private Library Manager offers a secure way to manage and share colour data across teams and suppliers. It’s about ensuring consistency, not just across materials, but across continents.
Extend the power of PantoneLIVE with Private Library Manager! Digitize, upload, store, and share precise spectral data for custom and brand colours and enjoy centralized access and control.
Looking Ahead
We’re excited about the opportunities that lie ahead with the SDC. Whether it’s contributing to technical discussions, supporting educational initiatives, or simply learning from others, we see this partnership to deepen our understanding and broaden our impact. And with the SDC, we’ve found a community that shares our commitment to colour excellence.
About X-Rite
Founded in 1958, X-Rite Incorporated is a global leader in the science and technology of color and appearance. X-Rite employs more than 800 people in 11 countries. The company’s corporate headquarters are located in Grand Rapids, Michigan, USA, with regional headquarters in Europe and Asia and service centers across Europe, the Middle East, Asia, and the Americas. X-Rite offers a full range of solutions used by manufacturers, retailers, printers, and graphic design houses to achieve precise management and communication of color and appearance throughout their processes. X-Rite products and services are recognized standards in the printing, packaging, photography, graphic design, video, automotive, paints, plastics, textiles and medical industries. For further information, please visit www.xrite.com. For the latest news, information, connect with X-Rite on LinkedIn and Facebook.