Through the analysis of a Norwegian book of manners and customs (Skikk og bruk), women’s magazines, interviews and discarded clothes the author shows that colours are dangerous because they break with a bourgeois aesthetic simplicity and because they refer to gender in a wrong way. However, when stating the reasons for this self-imposed asceticism, only economical and practical reasons are given, in addition to the idea that colours are becoming. Nevertheless, practice proves that this idea is subordinated to the ideology attached to colours. The clothing habits mantra is individualization and personalization, terms used to cover up obedience to a discipline.