# Memphis design: playful patterns and how to use them now

[Canonical HTML page](https://gradiently.design/guide/memphis-design)

Squiggles, confetti, terrazzo specks, clashing pastels and shapes that seem to have fallen out of a toy box. Memphis broke the rules of good taste on purpose, and its patterns still turn heads on packaging and brand art.

## The short version

- Memphis design comes from the Memphis Group, a collective of designers and architects formed in Milan at the end of 1980 around Ettore Sottsass.
- The group is said to have taken its name from the Bob Dylan song Stuck Inside of Mobile with the Memphis Blues Again, which played during its first meeting.
- Memphis style combines bright, clashing colours, black and white patterns, squiggles, dots and simple geometric shapes arranged in deliberately unbalanced ways.
- Memphis was a reaction against the restraint of modernism, treating decoration and humour as legitimate parts of design.
- Modern Memphis inspired design works best when the pattern is the frame and the message sits on a calm, readable area.

**Memphis design** is the playful, deliberately clashing style of the Memphis Group, a collective of designers formed in Milan at the end of 1980 around the architect Ettore Sottsass. Think bright pastels next to primaries, black and white squiggles, confetti dots, terrazzo specks and chunky geometric shapes stacked as if by a child. It was a protest against tasteful modernism, and its patterns are now everywhere from packaging to brand illustrations.

## A short history of the Memphis Group

In December 1980 Sottsass gathered younger designers, including Michele De Lucchi, Nathalie Du Pasquier, George Sowden, Martine Bedin and Matteo Thun, at his flat in Milan. A Bob Dylan record, *Stuck Inside of Mobile with the Memphis Blues Again*, kept repeating, and the name stuck. The group showed its first collection of furniture, lamps and objects in Milan in 1981, to a mix of delight and outrage.

Memphis pieces used cheap, cheerful materials such as printed plastic laminate in places reserved for fine wood, and mixed references from suburban kitsch to ancient architecture. Sottsass’s Carlton room divider, a totem of coloured laminate shelves, became the emblem of the style. Sottsass left in 1985 and the group wound down later in the decade, but its look had already spread through fashion, television sets and graphic design.

| Ingredient | What it looks like |
| --- | --- |
| Squiggles | Thick black wavy lines, like a hand drawn spring |
| Confetti and specks | Scattered dashes, dots and terrazzo flecks |
| Bold geometry | Circles, triangles, half moons and cylinders |
| Black and white texture | Grids, stripes and wriggly doodles like Sottsass’s Bacterio print |
| Clashing colour | Pastel pink beside cobalt, mint beside red |
| Unbalanced stacking | Shapes placed at odd angles, nothing quite centred |

The six ingredients of Memphis. Three of them together is usually enough to read as Memphis.

## Memphis design colours and palette

Memphis colour is about friction: sweet pastels set against hard primaries and a lot of black and white. Nothing is muted, and nothing is supposed to match politely.

- Bubblegum: #ff5fa2
- Banana: #ffd23f
- Pool teal: #29c5c5
- Cobalt: #3a4fd8
- Tangerine: #ff6b35
- Mint: #b8f2c9
- Squiggle black: #1d1d1d
- Laminate white: #fdf6e3

A Memphis palette. Use the off white as the ground, black for pattern and type, and three or four brights for shapes.

- Black hatching: `repeating-linear-gradient(45deg, #fdf6e3 0 14px, #1d1d1d 14px 18px)`
- Candy stripe: `repeating-linear-gradient(90deg, #ff5fa2 0 30px, #ffd23f 30px 60px)`
- Pool rings: `repeating-radial-gradient(circle at 0% 100%, #29c5c5 0 20px, #fdf6e3 20px 34px)`
- Sun on cobalt: `radial-gradient(circle at 70% 35%, #ff6b35 0 22%, #3a4fd8 22.5%)`
- Mint and bubblegum split: `linear-gradient(160deg, #b8f2c9 0 55%, #ff5fa2 55%)`
- Toy box wedges: `conic-gradient(from 45deg at 30% 60%, #ffd23f 0 25%, #1d1d1d 0 30%, #29c5c5 0 60%, #ff5fa2 0)`

Six Memphis backgrounds, each a single gradient with hard stops. Combine two in one design, never all six.

## How to make a Memphis pattern

A convincing Memphis pattern layers three things: a small repeating texture, a few large flat shapes and one hand drawn element such as a squiggle. The texture and shapes can be pure CSS, which keeps them crisp at any size. More pattern techniques are in [CSS patterns](https://gradiently.design/guide/css-patterns).

```css
.memphis {
  background-color: #fdf6e3;
  background-image:
    radial-gradient(circle at 100% 0%, #29c5c5 0 22%, transparent 22.5%),
    linear-gradient(135deg, transparent 0 80%, #ffd23f 80%),
    radial-gradient(circle at 0% 100%, #ff5fa2 0 18%, transparent 18.5%),
    radial-gradient(circle, #1d1d1d 2px, transparent 2.5px);
  background-size: auto, auto, auto, 22px 22px;
}
```

A teal circle at top right, a yellow corner triangle, a pink circle at bottom left and a black dot grid underneath. Add an SVG squiggle on top to finish it.

1. **Lay a quiet texture** Dots, hatching or terrazzo flecks in black on off white, small and even.
2. **Drop in two or three big shapes** A circle, a triangle and a half moon in different brights, partly off the edge of the frame.
3. **Add one squiggle** A thick black wavy line crossing one of the shapes. It is the detail that says Memphis.
4. **Leave a clear field for words** Keep the centre or one side calm. The pattern frames the message; it never runs behind it.

## Memphis type and lettering

Memphis graphics rarely used delicate type. Lettering was chunky, geometric or slightly odd, and it often sat at an angle or inside a shape. Pick one heavy or rounded display face, set it large, and let the pattern do the decorating.

- **Heavy geometric sans serifs** for headlines, set in capitals or bold lowercase.
- **Rounded faces** for a softer, toy like feel on kids’ and food brands.
- **Type tilted a few degrees**, or set on a coloured shape, for the off balance look.
- **Black or a dark cobalt for text**, never a pastel on a pastel.

## Using Memphis design now

Memphis returned in the 2010s through packaging, tech illustrations and fashion prints, and it still fits brands that want to feel fun, young and unpretentious: snack and drinks brands, toy shops, kids’ events, creative studios, playful apps. It suits banks, clinics and law firms far less, because their customers are looking for reassurance, not a joke.

A square party announcement reading Party at ours with a playful colourful background

A birthday announcement: the playful background fills the frame and the words sit on its calmest region.

A vertical product drop story for a new mango and chilli flavour on a bright background

A product drop story. Bright, cheeky, and still readable from the top of the safe zone down.

### Avoid

- Pattern running straight behind the headline
- Every bright colour in every design
- Thin type that vanishes among the shapes
- Memphis on a brand selling calm or trust

### Do

- A calm field reserved for words
- Three or four brights per design
- Chunky, rounded or heavy type
- Memphis where fun is the promise

Readability is the hard part with any patterned style. In Gradiently, a Mark moves its calmest region behind the words, relaxes busy detail near them and picks light or dark ink per line, which solves exactly the problem a Memphis layout creates. For more of this energy, see [bold graphic design](https://gradiently.design/guide/bold-design-ideas), [playful branding](https://gradiently.design/guide/playful-design) and the neon decade around it in [80s aesthetic](https://gradiently.design/guide/80s-aesthetic). For the modernism Memphis was rebelling against, read [Bauhaus design](https://gradiently.design/guide/bauhaus-design).

## FAQ

### What is Memphis design?

A playful style from the Memphis Group, a Milan collective led by Ettore Sottsass in the 1980s, known for clashing colours, squiggles, dots and bold geometric shapes.

### Why is it called Memphis?

The story goes that Bob Dylan’s Stuck Inside of Mobile with the Memphis Blues Again was playing on repeat at the group’s first meeting in December 1980.

### What colours are used in Memphis design?

Bright pastels such as bubblegum pink and mint, primaries such as cobalt and yellow, and plenty of black and white pattern.

### Who designed for the Memphis Group?

Ettore Sottsass led it, with designers including Michele De Lucchi, Nathalie Du Pasquier, George Sowden, Martine Bedin and Matteo Thun.

### How do I make a Memphis pattern?

Layer a small black texture such as dots or hatching, add two or three large bright shapes, then one thick black squiggle, and leave a calm area for text.