Reading time: 1:20 | In its time, Conda Green was a favourite. Here’s why.
In the seventies, life became more colourful than ever. Orange was the it-colour back then. But there was one green that has been a serious contender: Conda-Green. This colour name refers to nothing directly and is a pure invention of the car manufacturer Porsche. It first appeared in Porsche catalogues in the early 70s.
It was the golden age of the automobile with innovations on all levels, also and especially in the colour scheme. Conda-Green was the bad boys colour, the adversary to BRG (British Racing Green) from the 60s. While BRG dark, reputable with a slight olive feeling in the bottle-green range symbolised British understatement and English superiority in motorsport and is therefore still one of the favourite colours of solvent car collectors today, Conda-Green claims the opposite: a loud, striking, simple, powerful, precise appearance.
The name is no coincidence: Anacondas are green, aggressive and superior to any other snake in terms of strength and size. The term’s onomatopoeic references to the anaconda naturally resonate with the brand’s positioning. At that time, Porsche was not a traditional manufacturer for wealthy, more or less respectable gentlemen with a hat, but a relatively young manufacturer of light sports cars for a dynamic younger clientele with money, success and sideburns.
Expressive colours were en vogue in these pre-leasing times. Blood-orange (or vermillion), for example, was also popular, as it was in the Porsche interpretation a surprisingly sensitive mixture of red and yellow telling the same story of performance and success. Blood-orange, delicately leaning to red, separates itself to other typical orange applications of the time, e.g. bin-lorries, construction vehicles or furniture and lamps.
