Get ready for a lot more orange in your life, D.C.

Former Ward 5 councilman Vincent Orange is set to kickoff his formal campaign for D.C. Council Chair on Wednesday morning. But really, the campaign started this afternoon, when Orange appeared on NewsChannel 8’s NewsTalk with Bruce DePuyt — sporting, naturally, a bright orange tie.

Orange steps into the campaign to challenge current At-large Council member Kwame Brown. Ward 2’s Jack Evans had previously indicated he would also run for the top council job, but recently announced he will sit this one out.

Given the publicly rocky relationship that has developed over the last four years between the council and the mayor’s office, DePuyt started off by asking whether Orange has concerns about that sort of acrimony continuing into the future, especially if Fenty ends up winning the Democratic primary in September. Orange attempted to position himself as someone who could get along with either Fenty or his challenger, current D.C. Council Chairman Vincent Gray.

“Mayor Fenty has genuine respect for me, and I have genuine respect for him,” Orange said. “Vincent Gray has genuine respect for me, and I have genuine respect for him. And we’ll go from there.”

Orange previously ran for mayor in 2006, where he earned a piddly 3 percent of the vote in the Democratic primary. He stepped down from his position as a vice president at Pepco last month amid speculation he would enter the chair’s race.

Mastery of the details of recent political events wasn’t precisely evident in the rest of Orange’s interview, though he did hang in there fairly well.