Justice, faith and power: The history of the Mardi Gras colors

With Mardi Gras coming up soon, what better way to celebrate than to write about one of my favorite aspects of the holiday. 

Many might say that their favorite part is the parades, whether that is being on the floats throwing beads or cups or being in the audience trying to catch as many beads as possible. 

Some may say it’s just the feel of the holiday. There are also those that may say it’s king cake which in all honesty is understandable.

In my opinion my favorite aspect of Mardi Gras has always been its overall look. The outfits, the masks and the floats. All these things are just so pretty to me. Though I never really buy any of the stuff, I love to look at all the Mardi Gras themed stuff as I walk through the store or when I am at a Mardi Gras parade.

The masks and outfits are always just extremely extravagant and have this very regal feel to them. The mixture of jester stuff, masquerade ball-esque masks and feathers is just so appealing and cool to me. I couldn’t imagine Mardi Gras without half of this stuff.

As much I love all these things, I think a good part of my love for these things comes down to the color palette. Mardi Gras is known to have a color palette consisting of gold, purple and green. I don’t know why this may be but this is one of my favorite holiday color palettes. This has just always seemed like a really beautiful and eye-catching color palette to me. 

It could possibly be because of how vibrant they are together. This could also just be because purple is one of my favorite colors. Same with gold too due to the vibrance of the color.

Now, enough about my love for the colors. I’m here to ask the question, what is the reason behind this color scheme? I mean there surely is a reason behind it why this was Mardi Gras’s chosen color palette, right? 

From what I could gather these colors were chosen more than one hundred years ago at a parade known as the Rex Parade in 1892. The theme for the parade was “Symbolism of Colors” where they gave meaning behind the colors we now know as Mardi Gras’s color palette. Purple was meant to stand for justice, green was chosen to represent faith and gold had been picked to represent power.

Some people may have heard of this before and some may have not. While this does to some degree answer the question behind the meaning of the colors, it still feels like there is more behind these meanings. Like what is the reasoning behind these meanings assigned to each of the colors.

While I don’t have all the answers nor does the internet seem to have full answers for me either, I can try my best to speculate why these colors may have been picked to represent Mardi Gras as a whole. 

My guess may be that, to some degree, these colors do have a connection to wealth, power and royalty. I mean Mardis Gras already carries a very regal and wealthy kind of feel to it in general so it would make sense.

Purple has a very large connection to royalty as for a long time it had been a very expensive color for outfits that typically only members of royal families had access to. Same can be said about gold. From crowns to coins, gold has always stood as a prominent wealthy color even today. Green just so happens to also fall on the same spectrum. Green is greatly associated with wealth as well. I mean if you need any more proof just look at a dollar bill.

Now as for why such royal and wealthy colors would be used for Mardi Gras it is possibly due to its relations to Christianity and Jesus. The kingly aspect being a reference to Jesus and how many refer to him as a King. This could also just be a shot in the dark as well. As hard as I try to find clear answers most of it just comes out blank or confusing.

The link between Mardi Gras and Christianity can also be shown through king cake. Although it’s not done as much anymore. There used to be a baby hidden inside the king cake which was meant to represent Jesus. If you were the first one to find the baby then you would be considered king. 

Still though, even if I can’t find the full reason behind why these colors were picked for Mardi Gras, it won’t stop from loving the color scheme regardless as it was never the meaning behind the colors that made me fall in love with them. It was always the visual of the colors and how they are used. I can say without a doubt, the Mardi Gras color palette will always be one of my favorite combinations of colors due to its vibrancy, variety and overall beauty.