Haymes Paint runs a competition each Heritage Week, challenging people to create a unique and personal tint or colour from their memories or experiences.

Sharon Upham visited the Haymes site in the Ballarat Town Hall during the weekend. She was inspired by a 1920s Chinese embroidered dressing gown that she treasures, and one in a similar colour she had photographed on the catwalk at a Civic Hall fashion parade earlier that day.

A member of the Save Civic Hall committee, Sharon says she was overjoyed to be able to enjoy an event like the parade so soon after the hall reopening. She had a particular connection to the shade of green she's created.

"They hark back to the 1920s, this particular colour," Ms Upham says.

"I called it chinoise, the French for Chinese, and I later showed it to Charlotte Smith, the curator of the fashion parade featuring clothes bequeathed to her by her grandmother. She said it was a great name, and hoped I'd win!"

"The inspiration for the colour was a dress in the show, which was a slightly darker green. And I did it on the spot. If you'd asked me to go away and think about it, I don't think it could have been better."

Ms Upham says both her mother and sister are colourists, and colours has always been a great inspiration.

"I was brought up with an eye for colour. My sister has an incredible eye for colour; she can remember an exact shade without talking a sample with her.

Ms Upham's winning colour will be added to the Haymes Paint 2020 fan deck and have an animated colour story made about it. The animation will reference the fashion parade at Civic Hall.

Belinda Goodall says Sharon's colour was uncannily near to the predicted popular colours for next season.

"Those beautiful dusted pastels are part of what's going to be fashion forward," says Ms Goodall.

"Things come around again."