Objective:In the creative economy,employee creativity is considered one of the most important sources of innovation and organizational competitive advantage.The physical work environment,particularly its perceived quality,can influence employees’ cognitive and motivational processes.Despite the importance of color as a component of perceived environmental quality,empirical evidence regarding its role in enhancing employee creativity among employees of creative companies remains limited.Therefore,this study aimed to investigate the effect of perceived physical environmental color on the employee creativity of employees in advertising agencies in Tehran and to examine the mediating role of intrinsic motivation.

Methods:This applied,descriptive-survey study was conducted among 293 employees of advertising agencies in Tehran.Data were collected using a researcher-developed Physical Environmental Color Perception Questionnaire, Amabile’s Intrinsic Motivation Scale,and Zhou and George’s Job Creativity Questionnaire.Structural equation modeling was employed to test the hypotheses and examine the direct and indirect relationships among the variables.

Results:The findings indicated that perceived physical environmental color had a positive and significant effect on both intrinsic motivation and employee creativity.In addition,intrinsic motivation significantly mediated the relationship between perceived physical environmental color and employee creativity.The goodness-of-fit indices confirmed an acceptable fit for the proposed conceptual model.

Conclusion:The findings suggest that color,as a component of perceived environmental quality,can enhance employees’ intrinsic motivation and employee creativity.Accordingly,incorporating effective color strategies into workplace design,particularly in creative companies,can support innovative processes.Furthermore,the findings provide empirical support for evidence-based workplace design and indicate that improving workplace quality may contribute not only to organizational performance but also to strengthening innovation capacity and fostering the development of creative cities.