Call it a color conspiracy.

About six years ago, Color Marketing Group (CMG), a 36-year-old association of color designers from around the world, collaborated to make brown the color of the mid-1990s according to Thom A. Robinson at Color Portfolio, a New York-based color selection service.

Brown didn't catch on at first, Robinson explained, but persistence prevailed. "They were going to sell it until it sold. And they did it and it sold.

Now the fashion industry has done it again, and your brown wardrobe is on the way to becoming passe.

Long before this year's fall fashions were unleashed in Paris, Milan and New York, gray was predicted to be the color that would bring us into the new millennium.

Store fronts in preppy Harvard clothiers like Express and J. Crew now feature decapitated mannequins bearing winter collections in a thousand shades of gray.

This neutral color, say fashion retailer, is fast becoming the new basic for all wardrobes, and unlike the now-fading brown craze of the past two years, investing in gray may not only keep you a la mode today, but will probably be useful for many years to come.

"Gray is sort of replacing black this fall," said Patrick F. Duffy, sales associate at Australian clothier Country Road, 140 Newbury St. "It will be the new version of black."

That gray is the hot color now should not come as a surprise, Duffy said, "It all comes full circle. There are only so many colors to choose from. [Gray] is a very classic color, very traditional."

Color forecasters don't arbitrarily decide what hues should overtake your closet tomorrow, Robinson explains. Rather, they attempt to match colors with socioeconomic projections: bad economic forecasts, for example, might suggest bleak, subdued colors.

"Gray comes out of the political and social things of 'nothing is black and white anymore,' so it makes sense to be in the gray area of things," Robinson said.

However, for those whose fashion skin is deeper than the latest color craze, don't worry too much just yet about being a relic of the past.

"[Brown is] not obsolete," said Robinson, "but you're going to see less of it."

Even Brooks Brothers on 46 Newbury St. is embracing the gray theme, suggesting their clientele match conservative gold and burgundy, also popular colors for the winter, with a gray shirt or sweater. They currently offer an assortment of gold ties and shirts in their fast-turnover lines, collections rotated every six weeks to attract a younger customer base.

Of particular note at Brooks Bros. are $70 lightweight Merino wool v-neck, turtle and polo-style sweaters in variety of gray-friendly shades and hot-selling $68 mole-skin pants.