Cannot override controls foreground colour in wpf

Question

Hi all this is a problem that has been driving me crazy for a few days now.

Put simply whenever i declare a foreground colour on anything that derives from a TextBlock control that foreground colour is recognised at design time but at run time it always defaults to being black.

Its as if the foreground property is being ignored on the control.

So for example normally i would expect the following to render a button with white text:

<Button x:Name="MyButton" Content="Hello World" Foreground="White" ... />

However this renders a button and the foreground text colour is black. Its effectively ignoring the Foreground setter property.

The only way to get this to work as expected is to the do following:

<Button x:Name="MyButton" .... >
     <TextBlock Text="Hello World" Foreground="White"/>
</Button>

This way works and the button renders correctly with white text. But i know i shouldnt have to explicitly define the buttons textblock like this.

The same behaviour occurs with anything that derives from textblock.

Does anyone have any idea why this is happening ?

UPDATE: I have checked my solution for styles that are applied to TextBox. I have defined my own style on the TextBlock which is:

<Style x:Key="TextBlockText" TargetType="{x:Type TextBlock}">
    <Setter Property="Foreground" Value="#FF63798F"/>
    <Setter Property="FontSize" Value="14"/>
    <Setter Property="VerticalAlignment" Value="Bottom"/>
    <Setter Property="HorizontalAlignment" Value="Stretch"/>
</Style>

Which as you can see defines a value for the foreground. However when i remove this style from my resource dictionary the above problem still remains.

Additional information is that I am using the MahApps.Metro libraries and Im wondering if this is causing the issue.

Does anyone have any other ideas ? Or even thoughts of where to investigate ??

Are you sure? this works for me <Button Content="Hello World" Foreground="White"/> — Rohit Vats
you probably have a TextBlock default style which sets the foreground black, look int the entire solution for TargetType="{x:Type TextBlock} — makc
Also check for TargetType="Button" or ButtonBase. There is an issue with styles for sure. — abhishek
@RohitVats I am definitely sure this is what i would like to happen but unfortunately it is not happening. — Luke Devonshire
@makc Ive checked for this as well and the only textblock style I have is the style that I have specifically defined myself. Ive i remove this the issue remains. — Luke Devonshire

abhishek abhishek · Accepted Answer · 2013-08-18T09:47:28

Every control in WPF has a Template associated with it. I think somehow a style defined on your button which does not count the foreground property.

For instance,

    <Style x:Key="DialogButtonStyle" TargetType="Button">
    <Setter Property="Template">
        <Setter.Value>
            <ControlTemplate TargetType="{x:Type Button}">
                <Grid>
                    <Ellipse Fill="{TemplateBinding Background}"
                             Stroke="{TemplateBinding BorderBrush}"/>
                       <TextBlock Foreground="{TemplateBinding Foreground}">
                        <ContentPresenter HorizontalAlignment="Center"
                                          VerticalAlignment="Center"/></TextBlock>
                </Grid>            
            </ControlTemplate>
        </Setter.Value>
    </Setter>
</Style>

Can you use Style={StaticResource DialogButtonStyle} and define foreground for the Button. See here we used TemplateBinding on Foreground of the TextBlock rather than defining the color inside it.

Cannot override controls foreground colour in wpf

2 Answers