While word all always sounds a bit too optimistic, we’ll use it for the motivation – to expand already existing 110 shades of green with their names and appropriate HTML codes for every designer, blogger or just color lover who might need a certain tint or hue for green colors.
Green is very interesting if we focus on definition only. It’s one of the basic seven colors in the rainbow, part of the visible spectrum between yellow and blue, having the wavelength between 495 and 570 nm.
It’s a secondary color in the subtractive color system, being a mixture of yellow and blue, but a primary color in additive color system, used in TV technology. If you heard for RGB, you should know G in this abbreviation stands for green.
The simple fact that all colors in this system can be made of three primary colors (Red, Green, and Blue) causes pretty demanding task. Green is of course the color with max value of G (the value of FF in HEX system) and min values of R and B (values of 0), but many other mixtures with lesser amounts of G and higher of R and/or B look more or less greenish too. So several systems for naming these green colors were created.
That means we have literally hundreds, even thousands of different green shades. Some are closer to yellow, some to blue (several languages don’t distinguish between blue and green!), some to gray, etc. This post is an attempt to present as many green colors with their names, sorted in a human friendly way.
The Most Basic Green Colors
Here are two sets of colors, named simply green:
#008000 (0, 128, 0) Green (HTML) aka Office Green aka Green W3C #00A550 (0, 165, 80) Green (CMYK) aka Pigment Green #1CAC78 (28, 172, 120) Green (Crayola) #00A877 (0, 168, 119) Green (Munsell) #009F6B (0, 159, 107) Green (NCS)
You already noticed simple green is not enough. That’s why we added names of the systems, which used this basic name according to their logics.
#66B032 (102, 176, 50) Green (RYB) #00FF00 (0, 255, 0) Green (X11) #484A22 (72,74,34) Green (BS 4800 12 C 40) #009D74 (35, 164, 128) Green UP (Pantone) #00AB84 (0, 165, 80) Green C (Pantone)
If you are not familiar with the abbreviations, send me a note in comments. I should probably make a dedicated post on this theme too.
Green Shades Named After Obvious Characteristics
Before any of these classifications was created, people already used adjectives like light, dark, bright, bald, … to better describe the shade of green in question. Let’s look at several such tints:
#66FF00 (102, 255, 0) Bright Green #ADFF2F (173, 255, 47) Green-Yellow (Chartreuse) #006400 (0, 100, 0) Dark Green (X11) aka Electric Green aka Lime Green (X11) #013220 (1, 50, 32) Dark Green #03C03C (3, 192, 60) Dark Pastel Green
We are already dealing with a huge span of greens, aren’t we? I would like to warn you on the Green-Yellow color, also called Chartreuse (named after a drink, which, by the way, is just one of the many green colored drinks, just read on). Besides a fancy name it’s also a very special color positioned exactly in the middle of yellow and green in the HSV color wheel. This means it’s made of 50% green and 50% yellow.
#004953 (0, 73, 83) Midnight Green #B4D3B2 (180, 211, 178) Pastel Green #90EE90 (144, 238, 144) Light Green #98FB98 (152, 251, 152) Pale Green #39FF14 (57, 255, 20) Neon Green
Color poetically named Midnight Green is official color of the Philadelphia Eagles of the NFL. Later we’ll find several more examples of different green colors being used for uniforms or other official cases.
#0D865D (13, 134, 93) Bold Green #5E8C31 (94, 140, 49) Maximum Green #76FF7A (118, 255, 122) Screamin’ Green #9ACD32 (154, 205, 50) Yellow-Green #D9E650 (217, 230, 80) Maximum Green Yellow
Did you notice the differences between Green Yellow, Yellow-Green and Maximum Green Yellow? Such naming quickly leads to further complications. More complex naming system seems inevitable.
Green Color Shades Named After Herbs
Nature is full of green colors. It’s actually the first color we think about when we mention it. Next few sets will be related with nature, starting with herbs.
#A9BA9D (169, 186, 157) Laurel Green #354230 (53, 66, 48) Kombu Green #AAF0D1 (170, 240, 209) Magic Mint #BCB88A (188, 184, 138) Sage Green #737B6C (115, 123, 108) Thyme Green
We have already mentioned Chartreuse color with its unique position in the color wheel. Sage Green has a similar story. It’s a grey-green resembling the hue of dried sage leaves. As a quaternary color, it is an equal mix of the tertiary colors citron and slate (both confusingly also known as olive in different sources). We’ll come to the olive a bit later, but citron (on of the shades of yellow) and slate (a shade of gray) are discussed in other articles.
In the same palette one of numerous shades of mint is presented. Here are a few more:
#4FFFB0 (79, 255, 176) Bright Mint #3EB489 (62, 180, 137) Mint aka Mint Leaf #F5FFFA (245, 255, 250) Mint Cream #98FB98 (152, 251, 152) Mint Green #46877F (70, 135, 127) Mint Turquoise (RAL 6033)
The color Pear, for instance, also belongs to the family of chartreuse, but it’s much closer to yellow than green, so we could technically include it among yellow colors.
#808000 (128, 128, 0) Olive #556B2F (85, 107, 47) Dark Olive Green #3B3C36 (59, 60, 54) Black olive #A0955D (160, 149, 93) Olive Oil (Berger, Scib, Vista Paint) #847645 (132, 118, 69) Olive Paste (Sico, Crown Diamond)
A subfamily of olive green colors is so popular several paint makers create their own visions of this color. They are mentioned in the brackets right after the commercial names. To be honest we all probably know olives can vary a lot by color.
We are still not finished with the world of green plants.
#4F7942 (79, 121, 66) Fern Green #4D6F39 (77, 111, 57) Grass Green (RAL 6010) #6C7C59 (108, 124, 89) Reseda Green #325928 (50, 89, 40) Leaf Green (RAL 6002) #2F7532 (47, 117, 50) Japanese Laurel
Bud Spring Green Colors
#A7FC00 (167, 252, 0) Spring Bud #00FF7F (0, 255, 127) Spring Green #A3C1AD (163, 193, 173) Cambridge Blue #ECEBBD (236, 235, 189) Spring Green (Crayola) #177245 (23, 114, 69) Dark Spring Green
Don’t be fooled by the name Cambridge Blue – it’s a medium tone of spring green, official color brand of Cambridge University.
#00FA9A (0, 250, 154) Medium Spring Green #C9DC87 (201, 220, 137) Spring Bud (ISCC-NBS) #BDDA57 (189, 218, 87) June Bud #7BB661 (123, 182, 97) Bud Green #4C9141 (76, 145, 65) May Green
Spring is closely associated with color green, even more than winter with color white (many areas of the world hardly know about snow). With all the springs and buds in greenish shades we can definitely expect at least one sub-family of spring-greens:
Viridian Green Colors
#40826D (64, 130, 109) Viridian #009B7D (0, 155, 125) Paolo Veronese Green #009698 (0, 150, 152) Viridian Green #007F66 (0, 127, 102) Generic Viridian #007F5C (0, 127, 92) Spanish Viridian
Viridian is a dark shade of spring green and a quaternary color on the RYB color wheel. Viridian, of course, has a Latin origin, coming from viridis and meaning – green.
Last set of vegetation-related greens is related to larger areas dominated by green plants:
#228B22 (34, 139, 34) Forest Green #29AB87 (41, 171, 135) Jungle Green #7CFC00 (124, 252, 0) Lawn Green #30BA8F (48, 186, 143) Mountain Meadow #495D4E (73, 93, 78) Park Green (Behr)
Shades Of Green Color Names Related To Specific Places
#1B4D3E (27, 77, 62) Brunswick Green #72BE6D (114, 190, 109) Dublin (Behr) #00573F (0, 87, 63) Gotham Green #195905 Lincoln Green #50C878 (80, 200, 120) Paris Green
Brunswick Green is named after Braunschweig, Germany. It’s the color of famous pool tables. gotham, of course is one of the nicknames for New York. This particular tint is official color of NY Jets. You probably also noticed Dublin Green. Dublin, the capital of Ireland, has its own color, but this is not he only shade associated with Ireland.
Irish Green Color Shades
#004225 (1, 66, 37) BRG aka British Racing Green #00FF40 (0, 255, 64) Erin #4CBB17 (76, 187, 23) Kelly Green #009B69 (0, 155, 105) St. Patrick (Dutch Boy) #009E60 (0, 158, 96) Shamrock Green aka Irish Green
You may ask why color BRG (British Racing Green) belongs to Irish colors. The reason is simple. When the racing teams were established, racing was still illegal in Great Britain. so they moved to Ireland and took their color for the color of the team.
And if you didn’t know – Erin is a poetic name for Ireland.
#006A4E (0, 106, 78) Bangladesh Green aka Bottle Green #138808 (19, 136, 8) India Green #306030 (48, 96, 48) Mughal Green #01411C (1, 65, 28) Pakistan Green #00A693 (0, 166, 147) Persian Green
We have more places associated with green.
#00CC99 (0, 204, 153) Caribbean Green #5F996B (95, 153, 107) Jamaica Green (Ralph Lauren) #679267 (103, 146, 103) Russian Green #043927 (0, 78, 56) Sacramento State Green #009150 (0, 145, 80) Spanish Green
How About A Green Drink?
We promised to include a few colors named after green drinks and here they are.
#76B583 (118, 181, 131) Absinthe Green (Pantone) #C9D77E (201, 215, 126) Daiquiri Green (Pantone) #87F134 (135, 241, 52) Verde Manzana Green #2A603B (42, 96, 59) Midori Green #D0F0C0 (208, 240, 192) Tea Green
With this we conclude a list of 120 different shades of green colors. To be continued!
How Many Hues (Tones, Tints, …) of Yellow can You Name?
We’ll start with one hundred shades of yellow, all presented visually (images may vary according to each screen settings), with corresponding HEX and RGB codes. Yet this is only a beginning. We’ll add more until we reach several hundred known and named yellow hues, still with all HTML values, just like we did with colors blue and red.
Yellow by Definition / Standard:
01 yellow shades hex / yellow color names html
As you can already see, sometimes it’s hard to see a difference but sometimes yellow is not always as yellow as it could be. By physical definition, it’s a color of light in the visible spectrum lying between orange and green. Its wavelength is approximately 570 to 585 nanometers. CMYK values of yellow is defined by (0, 0, 100, 0) and HSV (60%, 100%, 100%), depending on the used color model. If it’s a primary color, it can’t be made of other colors, if it’s a secondary color, it’s a mixture of cyan, magenta and – yellow what makes it the only color present in both basic (and most popular) models.
You can imagine everybody and his grandmother tried to define such important color by his or her standards. Here are a few examples:
Yellow by Definition / Standard:
#FFF00 (255,255,0) Yellow (aka Electric Yellow aka X 11 Yellow aka Color Wheel Yellow)
As you can already see, sometimes it’s hard to see a difference but sometimes yellow is not always as yellow as it could be.
By physical definition, it’s a color of light in the visible spectrum lying between orange and green. Its wavelength is approximately 570 to 585 nanometers.
CMYK values of yellow is defined by (0, 0, 100, 0) and HSV (60%, 100%, 100%), depending on the used color model. If it’s a primary color, it can’t be made of other colors, if it’s a secondary color, it’s a mixture of cyan, magenta and – yellow what makes it the only color present in both basic (and most popular) models.
You can imagine everybody and his grandmother tried to define such important color by his or her standards. Here are a few examples:
#EFCC00 (239, 204, 0) Munsell Yellow
#FEDF00 (254, 223, 0) Pantone Yellow
#FCE883 (252, 232, 131) Crayola Yellow
#EDC001 (237,192,1) British Standard BS 4800 10 E 51 Yellow
#FFFF14 (255, 255, 20) XKCD Yellow
We won’t use the fourth value (for black or white) because it’s easy to make many different tints of yellow from red green and blue only. Here are two sets, one for light and one for dark hues:
Codes for Light and Dark Yellow Colors
#FFFFE0 (255,255,224) Light Yellow
#FFFFCC (255,255,204) Light Yellow 1
#FFFF99 (255,255,153) Light Yellow 2
#FFFF66 (255,255,102) Light Yellow 3
#FFFF33 (255,255,51) Light Yellow 4
While light yellow shades all look, well, yellowish, we can hardly recognize the same color in its darker tones. The next five colors are all formally yellow, but they definitely look very greenish and brownish to most observers.
#9B870C (155, 135, 12) Dark Yellow
#CCCC00 (204,204,0) Dark Yellow 1
#999900 (153,153,0) Dark Yellow 2
#666600 (102,102,0) Dark Yellow 3
#333300 (51,51,0) Dark yellow 4
Yet this is only a beginning at naming. So lively color can’t be described only by simple pronouns as light or dark or with some standardized numbers. For this reason, we’ll continue to present more and more poetic names, each one of them with corresponding color and hexadecimal code used in computer design.
Names of Yellow Colors by Characteristics
#FCBE11 (252, 190, 17) Bold Yellow
#FFEA17 (255, 234, 23) Bright Yellow
#F5B700 (245, 183, 0) Clear Yellow
#F4B800 (244, 184, 0) Classic Yellow
#FFE302 (255, 227, 2) Vivid Yellow
Nature proved to be a huge inspiration for the yellow color, very likely the most optimistic of all colors in the rainbow. We can find many yellow flowers and other plants, yellow is popular in the animal kingdom, there are yellow minerals, it found its way in the world of branding and technology.
For each group, we’ll present at least one set of five shades of yellow, sometimes closely related by their names, sometimes by their manufacturer, and sometimes without any obvious reason, but always trying to stay true to some logic in naming and grouping this popular color.
#FFB95A (255, 185, 90) Cape Jasmine or Gardenia (Kuchinashi)
#FFE078 (255, 224, 120) Summer Daffodil
#F8D86E (248, 216, 110) Forsythia Blossom
#FDC537 (253, 197, 55) Golden Marguerite
#FCC200 (252, 194, 0) Golden Poppy
As you may expect, this is just a beginning.
#F4CA16 (244, 202, 22) Jonquil
#FCB810 (252, 184, 16) Marygold
#FFB61B (255, 182, 27) Meadow Daisy
#FFF4BC (255, 244, 188) Mimosa
#D9B611 (217, 182, 17) Patrinia Flowers
Some flowers are of course more popular than others, so you can expect to find several variations of the same name for different yellow colors what is especially useful when we are dealing with paints for our cars, walls, fences, …
Just a quick note: Laura Ashley made a whole series of yellow paints (six of each) named Cowslip or Pale Cowslip, followed by a number. At the moment only one of them (Pale Cowslip 3) found its way on our list because most of others better fit to orange, brown or white families. Maybe we’ll add them later.
You can almost see the fruit, right? As you noticed orange and green subtones are present in this family of yellow colors and paints as well.
#F5E79F (245, 231, 159) Grapefruit (Earthpaint)
#D8C75F (216, 199, 95) Lanzones
#FFCC00 (255, 204, 0) Tangerine Yellow
#FDBE02 (253, 190, 2) Mango
#FFF0C5 (255, 240, 197) Pale Peach
Pale Peach is another popular color with literally dozens of variations which are mainly light shades of yellowish pink. On this list, we present only one of them. But we’ll check a whole set of colors named after lemon.
The color of pineapple is pretty popular among commercial paint-makers, so there are even more shades on the market. There are also paints with the same name but a different look. Pineapple Delight, for instance, by Porter Paints looks almost beige with HEX (F0E7A9) and by Earthpaint is slightly greenish with HEX (F2EBCA).
These colors are available on the market as commercial paints. So if you need a yellow paint for your kitchen, check them!
#FCD030 (252, 208, 48) Spring Squash (Valspar Paint)
Ten Hues of Corn Yellow
Corn is another popular yellow cereal plant. We present a set of five colors and five paints named after one of the world’s most important crops.
#FBEC5D (251, 236, 93) Corn
#FFC946 (255, 201, 70) Corn Harvest
#FFF2C2 (255, 242, 194) Creamy Corn
#FFF8DC (255, 248, 220) Cornsilk
#FFDF53 (255, 223, 83) Glazed Corn
Yes, yellow is a well-known appetite stimulant. Numerous spices belong to this family of happy colors, often verging on orange, red or brown families. Some of them, on the other side, can look more greenish.
As you can see, factories found inspiration in several different yellow or yellowish spices.
#F7F4CD (247, 244, 205) Fresh Lemongrass
#FFDB58 (255, 219, 88) Mustard
#FEB200 (254, 178, 0) Turmeric (Asian Paints)
#D8C75F (216, 199, 95) Fennel (Designers Guild)
#FEFAA1 254 (250, 161) Saffron Yellow
By the way, turmeric is the root of the plant with a scientific name Curcuma and the active substance called curcumin. Caparol made a whole family of paints named after Curcuma. Each one of them has an addition of a number. Here is an example of five additional tints:
Family of Curcuma Yellow Colors
#A48C28 (164, 140, 40) Curcuma 35 (Caparol)
#B4A04C (180, 160, 76) Curcuma 40 (Caparol)
#D0C48C (208, 196, 140) Curcuma 50 (Caparol)
#FCE474 (252, 228, 116) Curcuma 75 (Caparol)
#FCE894 (252, 232, 148) Curcuma 80 (Caparol)
The very same paintmaker have other numbers too, of course, but these are the most yellow. Some are actually tints of brown, green or even gray.
Attention: there are also groups of yellow or yellowish colors and paints, named after plants, animals, minerals, etc. Some groupsa will also be expanded (like mustard). We’ll cover them later. But we need to make several more articles (about green, for instance) before. Everything will be fine. Promise.
If you like the list and find it useful, please share it with your friends!
If you want to draw a frog, you have to decide if you want a simple, cartoon-like frog or more realistic amphibian. Any way you choose, we got your back covered. You’ll find several ways to draw a frog, simplified or advanced, step by step and with advanced tips to add another little extra to your frog and make it more believable, likable or whatever your goal is. If you want to draw a frog, you have to decide if you want a simple, cartoon-like frog or more realistic amphibian. Any way you choose, we got your back covered. You’ll find several ways to draw a frog, simplified or advanced, step by step and with advanced tips to add another little extra to your frog and make it more believable, likable or whatever your goal is.
Let’s start with a simple cartoon frog.
How to draw a cute cartoon frog?
In most cases, we start with a frog’s head. Essentially we just construct it from three circles or ovals.
Here is an example with a few additional lines and some color:
Or make it even cuter:
Just a quick pro tip – symmetric eyes are not the cutest possibility. If they are not looking straight to the observant, they make a more adorable impression.
Here is an example with asymmetric shapes, what gives an interesting effect of perspective:
And here is how a cartoon frog looks when it’s completed with a body and legs:
With some coloring (while green and earth tones prevail, frogs can be found in virtually every imaginable color), it’s made in less than five minutes:
Just a few ideas from Brockhaus’ Konversations Lexikon v.7, 1892 (Leipzig,Berlin,Wien)
Picture of different species of frogs:
Peron’s tree frog (Litoria peronii)
European fire-bellied toad (Bombina bombina)
Fantastic poison frog (Ranitomeya fantastica)
Yellow-spotted tree frog (Leptopelis flavomaculatus)
You probably noticed there are also two variations of drawings of morerealistic frogs, seen from the side (Method 1 and Method 3). They arevery easy and appropriate for total beginners as well. You can draw frogs like the one below or more complicated, depending on your ambitions:
A pretty good result can be achieved by a few basic shapes and black ink only:
Or make a silhouette frog-like one of next examples:
Which is actually a shadow of this frog (seen from bird’s eye view):
It’sa bit more sophisticated system, but there are still only basic lines used and you will get a pretty good frog even without coloring and shadowing in the last step (but you should try to apply that too,because, your frog will be even better after that).
At the end of this tutorial, they will offer you a tutorial in PDF format in exchange for your e-mail address. The decision is yours.
Two more tutorials are available on the next address:
The blue color looks clean, soothing, solid. It works great in most cases on its own, yet it can always make an even better impact if combined with a proper pair. In general blue looks great with just about everything.
It is well complemented with soothing colors like grey or green or earth tones what works great in rooms or clothes when you want to achieve a calm effect. It also makes great combinations with warmer contrasting hues of pink, orange, yellow or red in situations where you want something bolder.
We need to note there are hundreds of blue shades out there, so don’t expect the same perfect match for navy or royal blues like for baby or sky blue. All in all, the single most important decision when you are looking what color goes good with blue, is your purpose. So ask yourself what is your goal and in the meantime enjoy some of the best combinations already tested in various situations. What color makes the best match with blue?
What goes with dark blue?
By far the most known tones of dark blue colors are navy and royal. Let’s see some combination with dark blues!
Navy blue as a classic choice for the dress but also in room interiors, for instance, works perfectly with white. This classic choice is a classic and so versatile it’ almost impossible to imagine all the uses. Dark blue can be used as a base or as an accent and the same is true for white. All kinds of patterns will look nice when navy and white are combined. One such typical example is polka dot design.
Knowing the power of dark blue and white combination we can build up to more advanced combos.
All close relatives of white can do well with dark blue, yet in general, they will perform better with navy than royal, which, by most standards looks a bit more purplish.
Colors, which may compose great pairs with dark blue shade are pales like cream, grey (lighter hues), ivory, beige, peach, khaki, sand, tan, …
Here we can see several pastel colors on the navy blue background. Each one of them looks great, doesn’t it?
We can continue with the beige hues but this time with darker brown tones including mocha:
If you want to achieve a bolder effect, create an impact, make a statement – don’t hesitate to pair dark blue colors with other dark tones, including black. How about the saying you can’t wear black and navy blue together? Well, it’s just one of those urban myths without any scientific background. Similar colors (in this case dark tones) go well together. Always were, always will.
Colors That Match Light Blue
Light blue comes in numerous shades too. We may name them as baby, sky, dusty, azure, ice, angle, … blues and each one of them posses its specific character. Just think about the color of jeans, which can be manifested in dozens of shades supported by other shades of blue and complimented with black, grey or white threads. This is only a beginning because the jeans become a real thing only when is at least partially worn out and colors are a few tints moved from the original appearance.
We all know you can’t miss when wearing the blue or black t-shirt with a pair of trousers or a skirt made of jeans, no matter what shade of blue is colored by. Least known is a fact of usage of bolder, livelier colors with blue, like a yellow or an orange decorative threat which is still one of the signature signs of the legendary Levi’s.
If we want to answer what color compliments light blue, we can make at least three good answers:
1. Neutral, earthy tones
Brown may not be the first thought when thinking about the possible combos yet next picture shows they can make almost a perfect pair:
Blue jeans will undoubtedly always go with the brown belt and brown boots:
2. Most bright and muted colors
You can try to pair blue, including all lighter shades with most of the pastels. While it won’t look very good with pink, it can go very well with very bright shades of pink or purple shades:
3. Bold lively energetic tones or strong dark ones
Check these yellow and brown colors with light blue jeans!
We have a perfect match with light blue in yellow and light brown colors (the color of the skin can actually be one of these, as you probably already noticed). But beware:
Light blue (actually we can see all kinds of blues on the photo above) won’t work best with red because they are not opposites, but it can make a statement with yellow or orange which are. We have already seen that and here is another example:
As we can see below a pairing with a darker shade of blue can go long way as well.
All dark colors can work with sky blue or ice blue shades, which, in these cases become recessive. Apart from traditional light blue colors, we can play with numerous related shades with a significant amount of yellow or grey, like teal, turquoise or slate colors. If you need a bit of theory behind the colors, don’t forget checking this post where you’ll find what colors make blue.
We can find light blue in countless traditional designs, working as a softener in classic bathrooms where white and grey are dominating.
Almost the same effect is seen in this study room, where soft blue colored window frames instantly make the place more lively and playful.
Combinations of light blue can work very well with brown, yellow and gold tones, as presented in next spacious yet comfortable and intimate bedroom:
In next example, we can find the power of light blue in the role of an accent in a minimalistic bedroom with dominant beige and grey colors on pure white base. Believe it or not, blue can look spectacular as a wall paint. There is a full post just about blue wall paints with a whole world of opportunities for a designer in you.
Beige, creme, gold and of course white are signature colors of beach decorative theme when they are paired with lighter shades of blue. Next beach themed cake is a fine example of such combo.
We’ll throw more examples of different shades of blue colors in time. Think about this post as the work in progress, so don’t forget to bookmark it and get back after a while!
(26 Popular Brands of Makers, 105 Shades of Wall Paints in Blue Color and Counting!)
Blue paints can be used in all rooms in the house, sometimes as the base, sometimes as an accent. There are thousands of different shades of blue colors on the market, from grayish pale blues to rich almost purple blue tints. Here you’ll find an overview of the most popular paint brands with examples. Apart from commercial names, there are also HTML (HEX) and RGB codes and an SVG file which can be used as a coloring sheet to give you a hint of the look of your room before you even start visiting the stores and asking for samples.
All available paints were carefully selected and grouped according to the market needs. There will still be some overlapping, like light and sky blue color or teal and green-blue shades. Like it or not, colors can’t be classified in a unique universal system, but on the other hand, this is actually part of their charm, isn’t it? We have 12 major brands and seven basic groups of blue shades od paints with 105 examples at the moment but will expand the numbers at least up to 140 in the near future. Be patient and enjoy!
Light Blue Wall Paint
Light blue paint colors are mostly used for bathrooms, kitchens, bedrooms and living rooms. This family of colors has a cool soothing feel what is great as a base in rooms with running water. It makes a great combination of white and beige tones, even better with some accents like orange or gold or similarly lively colors of equipment or decor.
Here are several examples of pastel blue wall paint (first number is HEX code, in brackets is a RGB code):
#A1CAF1 (161, 202, 241) Sherwin-Williams Baby Blue Eyes
#98C9E2 (152, 201, 226) Dutch Boy Baby Cornflower
#C5D6E9 (197, 214, 233) Vista Paint Fluid Blue
#B6C8D1 (182, 200, 209) Dulux Quintessential Blue
#C9DBE2 (201, 219, 226) Olympic Goddess
Shades of light blue paint work great in a living room and a bedroom as well, especially if you see them as places of rest and contemplation. Even if you like a lot of visits and would like to put some soft blue color in a living room, it may work great as a complementary color to a dominant yellow or earth tones. Not to cool down the overall feel, but to make the warmth of the chosen base more interesting making a gentle contrast.
And there is another set of pastel blue paints for walls:
#CFECF4 (207, 236, 244) Benjamin Moore Tear Drop
#468FA2 (70, 143, 162) Ralph Lauren Aegean Blue
#BDD7E6 (189, 215, 230) Nippon Paint Lite Up
#84C8DB (132,200,219) Dunn-Edwards Bayshore
#7996A3 (121, 150, 163) Designers Guild Swedish Blue
As you can see the idea of light blue paint overlaps with sky blue, grey blue and green blue colored paints.
Sky Blue Paint
Paint in sky blue tones is also soft, light and best for the same rooms as the tints above. Blue is not the first choice for a living room or a bedroom but can work just fine if it’s matching other used colors and the characters of people in those places. Remember – you are not obligated to use it just for walls. It can make a spectacular expression for ceilings or, if you are bit extravagant (but just a bit) can be used on one wall only.
#C9D2C6 (201, 210 198) Farrow & Ball Silvery Blue
#D4E9F2 (212, 233, 242) Benjamin Moore Cumulus Cotton
#ADC5DD (173, 197, 221) Nippon Paint Blue Aura
#BBDDDF (187, 221, 223) Pratt & Lambert Debonair
#CAD6E8 (202, 214, 232) Asian Paints Blue Dawn
Sky can be more greenish, purplish or greyish, but it’s still cerulean.
Some shades posses more of white, others of green and yet others of purple tones. It’s up to you to choose the best for your room.
Blue Grey Paint Colors
Blue grey paint is still in the same family as already presented light and sky shades. It’s actually a really vague area of differences, where the same name fits in more than one group. To make things even more interesting some manufacturers make the same color but give them different names and there are also paints sharing the same name, but looking significantly different.
It’s very important to do your research right and think twice before you make a final decision. We hope next set of examples with brand names and RGB codes will help:
#C6DBE6 (198, 219, 230) Dulux Mineral Mist
#C7D5E2 (199, 213, 226) Nippon Paint Windsurf
#909A9A (144, 154, 154) Benjamin Moore Gibraltar Cliffs
#E0ECEF (224, 236, 239) Dutch Boy Blue Sparkle
#ACBEBF (172, 190, 191) Taubmans Mohawk Blue
All blue grey colors look pretty conservative and are often called soft, pale or powder. Still, there are numerous options to choose from.
#CFDEE1 (207, 222, 225) Pratt & Lambert Astrachan
#7F909E (127, 144, 158) Valspar Paint Royal Gray
#99ACB2 (153, 172, 178) Behr Blue Fox
#CCD7E1 (204, 215, 225) Ralph Lauren Blue Mesa
#BDC9CD (189, 201, 205) Vista Paint Water Droplet
#D8E1E6 (216,225,230) Dunn-Edwards Pearl City
#548090 (84, 128, 144) Plascon Gray Saturday
#B0B6C6 (176, 182, 198) Martha Stewart Faded Ink
#C8CFD5 (200, 207, 213) Kelly-Moore Wind Weaver
#6D888A (109, 136, 138) Farrow & Ball Stone Blue
Not an easy decision, right?
Royal Blue Paint Colors
Royal blue is a completely different story than pastels above. It’s much darker (although not really dark) and stronger, tending to impress at first sight. Of all rooms in the house, it works best in bedrooms. It brings a specific energy and elegance which can be used in other rooms as well, but maybe not as the base color.
Here are examples of probably the most classy paint colors of all:
#334688 (51, 70, 136) Vista Paint Blue Highlight
#32356C (50, 53, 108) Rodda Paint Frozen Blue
#375995 (55, 89, 149) Glidden Deep Sapphire Blue
#1A3C5D (26, 60, 93) Dulux Oxford Blue
#7085A1 (112, 133, 161) Behr Magic Spell
It’s interesting to note there is still not a clear difference between royal and navy blue, what is caused by numerous changes in uniforms due to different circumstances like materials, weather conditions and political decisions. One more reason to check as many samples as possible before you order your favorite color for the interior.
#464962 (70, 73, 98) Dunn-Edwards Intergalactic
#4A4C63 (74, 76, 99) Kelly-Moore Grand Grape
#546988 (84, 105, 136) Valspar Paint Waterloo
#48596D (72, 89, 109) Ralph Lauren Rue Royale
#0080B2 (0, 128, 178) Behr Royal Peacock
#483D4C (72, 61, 76) Berger Midnight Affair
#3D4D64 (61, 77, 100) Kelly-Moore Blue Moon Bay
#000068 (0, 0, 104) Plascon Nights Cloak
#494D8B (73, 77, 139) California Paints Beaded Blue
#004476 (0, 68, 118) Pratt & Lambert Sailor Suit
The paint makers don’t necessary match the word royal with a royal blue as designers define it. So it’s probably best to choose it by look, not by name.
Dark Blue Paint
Dark blue paint is more serious than all colors before, even more than gray-blue tones, which are probably the most conservative of all possible blues. Dark blue is often very close to black, but we decided to present only paints from medium dark family because almost black truly belongs to another article.
It is used for bedrooms, bathrooms, living rooms, but looks very good on doors and furniture too. Check this set:
#213F49 (33, 63, 73) Sherwin-Williams Moscow Midnight
#2F425B (47, 66, 91) Dulux Sapphire Salute
#343457 (52, 52, 87) Benjamin Moore Midnight Navy
#2E4353 (46, 67, 83) Dutch Boy Blue Navy
#283D3E (40, 61, 62) Rodda Paint Atlantic Waves
Most dark shades of blue paint have names related to the night or (deep) waters, navy and other authoritative uniforms included.
#000050 Plascon Neptunes Castle rgb(0, 0, 80)
#484B62 California Paints Blue Suede Shoes rgb(72, 75, 98)
#214269 (33, 66, 105) Designers Guild Moonlight Blue
#404950 Kelly-Moore Baffin Island Night rgb(64, 73, 80)
#2B3040 Farrow & Ball Drawing Room Blue rgb(43, 48, 64)
#00656F (0, 101, 111) Sico Underwater Cave
#3F455A (63, 69, 90) Glidden Federal Blue
#445055 (68, 80, 85) PPG PPG Pittsburgh Paints Obsidian
#43546E (67, 84, 110) Martha Stewart Lost Mitten Blue
#305174 (48, 81, 116) Taubmans Virginia Blue
Even the dark blue colors can vary a lot. Some of them verge on dark green, others on black and others are classified as only ‘medium dark’ paints.
Teal Blue Paint Color
The family of teal colors has much higher percentage of yellow in the mix and always look slightly greenish. This gives the paint more live and freshness, which can be used in every room in the house. If blue is not the first choice for dining rooms because it suppresses appetite, teal can actually be the right choice. You can put it on walls, ceilings, doors, wood, plastic or metal – teal can find a way to look great almost in every situation.
Did we mention it goes well with numerous other colors?
#2D9CA2 (45, 156, 162) Benjamin Moore San Jose Blue
#89D9D1 (137, 217, 209) Sherwin-Williams Tantalizing Teal
#007D83 (0, 125, 131) Behr Tuscon Teal
#458083 (69, 128, 131) Olympic Teal Zeal
#1F9995 (31, 153, 149) Rodda Paint Pleasant Stream
Teal colors can be really tricky, because while there are clear borders between teal, aqua and turquoise according to the percanteges of blue and green components in RGB systems, there can still be huge deviations if we add a bit of red, or a lot of red or decrease blue and green at the same time or …
#499CA0 (73, 156, 160) Dunn-Edwards Montego Bay
#7DA79F (125, 167, 159) Ralph Lauren Sunwashed Blue
#00909B (0, 144, 155) Sico Limpid Lagoon
#48B3B1 (72, 179, 177) Designers Guild Marine
#D0E6DE (208, 230, 222) Martha Stewart Blue Topaz
#77CDC5 (119, 205, 197) Valspar Paint Nautical
#007177 (0, 113, 119) Laura Ashley Deep Turquoise
#21929D (33, 146, 157) Olympic Safe Harbor
#78D4D0 (120, 212, 208) Kelly-Moore Aqua Zing
#739499 (115, 148, 153) Asian Paints Rustic Twist
Teal blue paints for walls are one of new trends where cool pastel tones are combined with more lively ones. They work great in many different combinations as well.
Blue-Green Wall Paint
If teal looks greenish, some of next paints look almost green. They are right in the middle of blue and green, what means they possess a substantial amount of lively yellow. This energy gives can be used in all rooms, including halls.
Green blue is often very close to or is even overlapping with teal, what is understandable if we know how are both made – from blue and green pigments.
#548E89 (84, 142, 137) Taubmans Spruce Blue
#5B9E9B (91, 158, 155) Asian Paints Still Blue
#85E0D3 (133, 224, 211) Rodda Paint Glorious Garden
#DEE5DE (222, 229, 222) Laura Ashley Powder Blue 1
#3A7676 (58, 118, 118) Valspar Paint Ocean Slumber
#005B62 (0, 91, 98) Dutch Boy Marina
#9FB1A7 (159, 177, 167) Behr Smokey Slate
#B7CECB (183, 206, 203) Designers Guild Celadon
#DBE5E3 (219, 229, 227) Benjamin Moore Winter Ice
#01888B (1, 136, 139) Nippon Paint High Trek
Try one of the presented blue colors on the wall of this virtual room!
Next image is made in the SVG format, readable by Inkscape or Adobe Acrobat.
We used two of presented blue wall paints (Behr Magic Spell for left and Sherwin-Williams Baby Blue Eyes for right wall by default), but you can change them with each of presented wall paints if you use one of accompanying codes.
1. Download it and save to a folder where you’ll have access to one of the programs able manipulating SVG formats. 2. Open it with a chosen program. 3. By clicking select one of the two walls in the picture and enter a code (HTML or RGB) to see the look of each of the presented blue paints which might be interesting for you. 4. (optional) You can change the color of the equipment too!
If you are thinking about a combination of blue with other colors, we have made a post about this as well. You are more than welcome to read Colors That Match Blue.
Remember – with all possible tools and examples you’ll still get only an approximation. For the real thing, you’ll eventually need to paint a part of the wall in question and see how the paint looks at different times of the day. We still hope our collection of different tones of blue wall paints helps a bit!
Acrylic paints are popular among beginners in the art world for their ease of use, attractive appearance, and almost countless available hues. Work with acrylics is fast, results don’t change with time (at least in roughly last six or seven decades while they are on the market), their level of toxicity is relatively low and cleaning rarely demands more than some soap and water. All these characteristics made acrylic paints a favorite choice for students of painting.
But some of these pros can also fire back (for instance if you need more time for working with color, they can dry too fast) or demand some additional knowledge to use them to their full advantage. Of course, this knowledge is not available to rookies, so it’s only fair to provide as much tips and tricks for working with acrylics.
Here is a growing list coming from all publicly available sources on- and off-line, mixed with advice of seasoned artists with many years of experience in this area:
Quality and Price
* Generally you can get acrylics in two basic qualities: for students and for artists (professionals). Beginners should obviously start with less expensive students’ acrylics, which have a lesser percentage and lower quality of pigments and slowly build up their assortment of colors to better and more expensive products which can be (due to their density) also slightly more demanding to work with.
* While the price and quality correlate in the world of acrylics pretty logically, you can still save significant amounts of money by:
– buying so-called painting sets varying from 5 to 100 US dollars for 4 to 36 colors in smaller or bigger tubes;
– carefully watching for coupons and discounts for the colors you want;
– ordering your most used hues in bigger packages (some are available even in 35 oz jars);
– combining students’ and artists’ paints (the same color can vary in price by the factor five or more, yet both can do the job equally well for some specific tasks)
* All major brands offer dozens of quality paint and related products in wide range of quality and prices, including more liquid or more buttery versions of acrylics. It’s up to each individual artist to experiment with available items to meet the best results.
A Starter Pack
* Quickness of drying and simplicity of manipulation should be first concerns for beginners. This means only the necessary colors, canvases or boards, and brushes, zero additives like solvents, gessos or primers, palette knives, spatulas, sponge applicators, etc. You’ll also need a palette, some paper towels and a few jars for water.
* Being a beginner is not always bad. For instance, you start from scratch, what means you need all basic colors, so you can reduce the price per color with buying a full set of jars at once. You can get for instance Liquitex set of 48 tubes for less than 25 dollars. Of course, some of the colors will be empty very soon, but you can buy these ones (and only these colors) in bigger containers.
* As a beginner you can skip many items, but you can’t go without a decent brush. Or maybe two: rectangular (flat) and pointed (round). Both come in different sizes, basically grouped in large, medium and small families. In general, beginners find bristles made of a synthetic material more practical than the ones made of natural hair. Most manufacturers offer special brushes made for acrylic paints, which are more durable than ones made for watercolor.
Being On The Budget
* Size of the paint jar is another way to stay within the budget. If you need one or two colors all the time, buy them in bulk and save your bucks thanks to quantity.
* Some of the colors will inevitably disappoint your expectations and others will simply tempt you to buy them just to try how they look in action. In both cases, you can save a lot of money just by buying all untested paints in smallest possible jars or tubes.
* Never forget another important fact about the acrylics. They mix with each other independent of quality, quantity or brand. All residues can be used for creating interesting hues or maybe even for special undercoats to create special effects.
* Typical starter pack of brushes for acrylics consists of 12 pieces with nylon bristles and costs around 15 dollars. In the same package, you’ll probably get a palette too. Another good news: the same pack is useful for aquarels and oils as well.
* For large areas you can use the cheapest household brushes (or apply color with other more or less improvised tools) and save some additional money.
* A palette is not a must. Every surface useful for mixing paints can work well, depending on your wishes.
* Apart from Artists’ and Students’ grade acrylics, you can use for some projects even cheaper Craft acrylic paints. Their quality is significantly inferior to both mentioned before, but they can be used for creating special effects or for underlayers.
* The quality (and price) of your working surface should reflect the quality of used paints. You’ll probably paint walls in an apartment with Craft, paper with Student and canvas with Artist quality paints.
Initial Set of Colors
While you can do a lot of interesting projects even with one single color, most of the users start with ten basic colors, from which most of the desired tones can be created. According to several contemporary artists, these are:
But you can be even skimpier. We all know the basics of mixing colors what means, in general, we can make the whole rainbow from just three basic colors.
Well, the actual process of mixing is a bit more complicated, what in practice means you need two different basic colors for all possible secondary and tertiary colors:
Ultramarine Blue for making blueish purple tones
Quinacridone Red for making reddish purple tones
Cadmium Yellow for making yellowish orange tones
Cadmium Red for making reddish orange tones
Hansa Yellow for making yellowish green tones
Cerulean Blue for making blueish green tones
Where to Buy Acrylic Paints
You can obviously get them in specialized craft & hobby stores, where you can get a lot of very useful info about the paints you need for your projects. Michaels is the most well-known among them. Some other names are A. C. Moore, Artist and Craftsman Supply, Hobby Lobby, Jo-Ann, Pat Catan and Old Time Pottery.
Large supermarkets like Home Depot, Target and Wal-Mart offer almost all major brands of acrylics suitable for students and sometimes for artists too. They also offer many good bargains for some paints, but don’t expect highest quality stuff.
Buying acrylics on-line is another popular alternative, especially useful for people who don’t leave near stores with acrylics. It pays to follow most interesting pages to find when you can get nice discounts with coupons, free shipping etc. Apart from biggest companies like AliExpress, Amazon and eBay, there are also Ambience Design, Blick, Create for Less, Etsy, Factor Direct Craft, Oriental Trading, Scrapbook and Save-On-Crafts. Don’t hesitate examining their offers!
These are not a must but you’ll find you need them very soon, so it’s better to be prepared:
an apron (yes, painting can be a messy job)
several clean containers for water (you’ll need to clean brushes, put them off for a moment, etc.)
spray bottle (occasional mist of water on the unfinished painting can help you prolongate your working time for hours)
paper towels (for cleaning the excess paint)
Few Pro Tips for the End
Always wash your brushes right after you are done. Some soap and water should do.
Better (and more expensive) paint in most cases leads to better results.
Before you start working with canvas, always prepare it with gesso, even if it is already ‘gessoed’.
What are the Best Brands of Acrylics for Students and Professionals?
Acrylic paints are very likely the best kind of medium for an inspiring artist who is still learning the basic tricks of the trade. While everybody at some point stops feeling like an absolute beginner, acrylics still remain popular among more experienced painters. Many professionals specialize in acrylic colors due to their ease of use and numerous possibilities they offer.
What is Acrylic Paint Made of?
We can answer this question with a little digging in the history. First acrylics were made in 1934 by German chemical giant BASF and came into commercial after the second world war. They were made from polymers (hence the name – after acrylic polymer emulsion) and intended for painting walls of the houses.
Their versatility, quick drying time (compared to oil-paint) and durability brought the attention of the artists right after they hit the commercial market (around 1950). Being able to look sharp as oil paints or soft as watercolors, acrylics soon became the first choice for beginners and a welcome addition to the skilled artists’ repertoire.
In next years producers of acrylic paints offered more and more new colors, with different synthetic pigments entering the market, being mixed with various solvents and a whole spectrum of proportions between them. While each paint offers the best possible solution for a particular problem, some basic rules for defining why some acrylics are better than others.
It is also not surprising to find out some brands actually specialized for very specific artistic niches and we’ll try to explore as many of them as possible. In general, we can say more pigment means richer (and thicker) paint, what is closely connected with a higher price. But the price should never be the main concern when buying acrylics.
The main advantages
They come in huge variety of forms:
With an addition of a growing collection of specific mediums, we can also manipulate many visual and mechanical properties of acrylics what makes them popular in a wide range of creative and technical areas.
Tools for working with acrylics, like palettes or brushes, are really easy to clean. In most cases, some warm water and soap can do the trick.
It is much shorter than at oil paints, where a layer needs several days up to several weeks to dry off, so we can apply the next layer of acrylics within a day or two. The working session for an artist is shorter, his focus easier to maintain, results achieved faster and his efficiency higher.
If we need to delay the drying time, we can slow the process with a spray bottle of water. Several new acrylics with so-called retarders offer prolonged time for further manipulation.
We definitely can’t compare acrylic paints with oils or watercolors, but in a little more than half of century they proved as very durable, resistant to mechanic pressure (they don’t crack, like oil paint), are thermoplastic, what gives them way better temperature resistance and are often displayed on canvass without glass screen protection, which is almost a must for oil paintings. They also offer great UV resistance and are even used as protection for other materials.
All these characteristics should be no surprise if we remember they were initially made for house paintings. One of the best characteristics of acrylics is undoubtedly their flexibility and ability to be painted over without being affected when dried. Another characteristic, usually obtained first of all is a simple fact of apperance of acrylics not changing a lot after they dry, they often look exactly the same as at the momemnt they were squeezed out of the tube, what is definitely not the case at oils.
Before we start, we rarely think about the ’side effects’ of painting. Already mentioned cleaning is just tone of them. Another important characteristic of paints is their smell. In this area, acrylics have a significant advantage before the oils because their odour is in general much lower and often even hardly noticeable.
After a full-time working day in the artistic studio, the smell in your clothes, hair, and skin could stick for hours, what can be of great importance for everybody.
One very important advantage is similarity of the look of freshly applied acrylic color to already dried and mature finish. This is definitely not the case with watercolors, where dried paint always looks several tones differently than the initial mix on the palette. Predictable results make painting much easier, especially for beginners.
Acrylics are less toxic than oil paints because they produce less toxic fumes during work and cleaning. While pigments can still be toxic (and some fillers and retarders too), the main solvent (water) is not problematic at all. Same is true for cleaning, which is not only safer but much faster as well.
Depending on the level of dilution, or, if we may be more precise, the concentration of pigment in water, we can achieve effects of watercolors or oil paints, using the best of the both ’classic’ worlds of painting. Acrylics are very useful in numerous combinations with other types of colors too.
We can use them on canvas, ceramic, fabric, paper, terracotta and wood, where they can mimic other types of colors, but in most cases offer their signature realistic look, which possesses a very special magic to so many artists they simply can’t resist using them as a standalone media or an addition to others.
This store (Michaels) brand is quite popular due affordability of their acrylic paints. Apart from beginners who are still experimenting and have often limited budget some seasoned artists use Artist’s Loft acrylics as well. The price is low for simple reason – they have pretty low percentage of pigment, what means you may need several layers of paint squeezed right out of the tube before you adequately cover the canvas. n the other hand that might be just the effect you are looking for if you are aiming at translucent effect when using multiple layers of different colors.
Painters who want to cover large amounts of their working surface fast will find Artist’s Loft brand just right for the job because they have very good viscosity and flow, but when you want to work on details, you’ll have to use something else. Another thought about the price – it’s really great for beginners and for experimenting, what means huge pool of potential users (everybody started as a bwginner and everybody should experiment at least from time to time), but cheap paint which need two, three or even more layers to cover the base, will very likely stop being inexpensive if we compare it with a superior color which does the same job in a single stroke.
Blick Art Materials
Blick Art Materials were established by Dick Blick (with his wife Grace) and are the oldest supplier of art materials in the USA. Their products cover whole spectrum of painters, from total beginners to seasoned professionals, who are looking for the best only. Blick acrylic paints can be ordered 24 hour a day, 7 days a week and are in most cases shipped within 24 hours. They are also very proud of their competitive prices. It’s near to impossible to list all their acrylics, with artist grade, fluid, student, classroom, decorative and all other groups of paints you can possibly imagine.
Yes, they offer interference, iridescent, and pearl colors too.
Australian manufacturer Chroma has two sets of acrylic paints on the market: Educational and Fine Art. Both of them has several subgroups trying to satisfy just about every artistic need. Among Chroma Educational Acrylics we can find Chroma Kidz, made for preschoolers, which is washable, and Chromacryl with a wide range of uses from early childhood to tertiary school. For Senior Schools, they sell Atelier A2 Acrylic suiting art students and devoted hobbyists. These paints are high quality, yet without the pricey tag and very likely one of the best buys for artists who still learn, but good enough to add into Fine Art group too, where we can find heavy body Atelier Interactive Artists’ Acrylic, flowy Chroma’s Jo Sonja Artists’ Colours, and fluid Atelier Free Flow Artists’ Acrylics.
The main difference between Atelier series and majority of other acrylics is in their drying – instead of forming a hard skin, they just thicken what gives an artist ability to extend the drying time with simple spraying of pure water. Reviewers report they offer a truly ‘wet on wet’ experience, which is typically not available in this medium. It’s even possible to make already dried paint wet and workable again! There are about 80 different hues available, all coming in 80 (2.5 oz) ml tubes and 250 (8.5 oz) ml jars with several popular colors in 1 l (35 oz) bottles as well.
This company is based in England, but have warehouses and offices in the USA too. Their beginnings date almost 250 years ago when Richard and Thomas Rowney started with a production of colors for artists. Constant improvement and expansion of the company led to the creation of first acrylic paints in Europe in 1963. Rowney’s Cryla colors became one of the signatures of Pop Art in the 1960s and are still on the market, standing the test of time and being one of the best brands for acrylic paints in the world.
After the merge of George Rowney’s Company with Daler Board Company in the 1980s, one of the most important manufacturers of art supplies was formed, continually growing in all three key areas for painters: paints, brushes, and surfaces. The current line of Daler-Rowney’s acrylics (CRYLA professional acrylic line) offers 87 different colors, known by their very heavy body buttery feel and lightfastnesses, ideal for artists who want to create so-called impasto effects.
Best known brand of acrylic colors by Deco Art is definitely Americana, relatively high quality student paint for affordable price (we are talking about a dollar for an ounce), popular for its ease of use, but with much lower levels of pigment than competitors with Artist grade paints. Americana comes in handy bottles, is fluid, can occasionally need more than one layer for covering the surface, but is widely used not only for artistic projects on canvasses, but for decorative and craft purposes in all possible areas (miniatures, furniture decor, walls, …). Especially popular are Deco Art Americana Acrylic paint sets with more than 30 different colors in small bottles, which are available in several specialized stores and on-line as well.
In general Americana offers matte finish, which is not a typical acrylic look, where we mostly expect gloss, but several users reported they prefer using it exactly for that reason – with a background or majority of painting in matte an addition of glossy acrylic paint helps the to pop out a desired detail or emphasize a part of the picture or something else. This should probably answer the always on-going debate about the quality. Of course there are better (and much pricier paints on the market), but this doesn’t necessary mean the ‘better’ paint will proved better results for your specific project.
FolkArt is known by their artist-quality acrylics with a creamy consistency and superior hide qualities, what makes the great for base coating, blending and highlighting. They can be used on canvas, metal, plaster, textile and wood. There are also trendy metallics among their paints. All of them are certified as acid neutral and non-toxic.
There are 243 different colors in the FolkArt Premium family and 31 FolkArt Metallics altogether, both available in 60 ml (2 oz ) bottles. 18 most popular colors can be bought in 235 ml (8 oz) bottles too. Their color palette is undoubtedly one of the largest in the market.
You can’t buy an acrylic paint without at least considering one from the Golden’s offer. In general, they have four main groups of different viscosity. High Flow Acrylic paints have 49 different colors of ink-like consistency and durability of dry paint, including Fluorescent and Iridescent paints. Open Acrylics are slow drying paints offering increased time for working in most of the traditional techniques with currently 73 colors available.
Golden Fluid Acrylics are characterized by flowing ability, which makes them useful for pouring, spraying and drawing details, and intensity comparable to the most known heavy body acrylics. Their consistency is achieved without fillers or extenders and is available in 66 different colors. And there is, of course, a Heavy Body group, probably the most popular among Goldens with the most colorful offer of 100 % acrylic emulsion available for professional artists – 108 colors altogether.
Grunbacher is on the market from 1905 and it definitely had its ups and downs. Today it’s a part of Chartpak Inc., but still, continues the tradition of the American brand. Their line called Academic Acrylic offers 48 brilliant colors including metallics and iridescent. All of them are labeled with 1 – Excellent according to ASTM lightfast rating (resistance to change at exposure to light).
These acrylic colors are available in tubes in four different volumes: 75 ml (2.5 oz), 90 ml (3 oz), 150 ml (5 oz) and 200 ml (6.75 oz). For many painters, Grumbacher means some kind of best value because they offer high quality for affordable (student) price. The company is well-known by their artistic forum and other kinds of support.
Liquitech acrylic paints are the first choice for art students. Their Basics offer 36 different colors in matte and 48 in a satin finish, which is favorite among skilled painters as well. Liquitex Soft Body is a family of 89 fluid colors suitable for painting wide range of materials from classic canvas or ceramics to different fabrics and murals.
Liquitex also offers heavy body and super heavy body colors in 100 and 27 different hues respectively. These highly pigmented paints are thick and rich, of buttery smooth consistency, what makes them perfect for traditional painting on panel or canvas or experimental techniques. Liquitex is hardly missed in any professional’s repertoire.
Ranger Ink is American manufacturer of quality inks, paints and accompanying craft products with several signature lines of artistic items created after specifications of real artists. In the field of acrylics, we should mention at least Dina Wakley Media (Dina Wakley), Distress (Tim Holtz) and Dylusions (Dyan Reaveley). Distress contains 63 very fluid colors, Dina Wakley Media 9 heavy body acrylics 6 metallics, and Dylusions 24 colors with viscosity somewhere in between. All can be bought on-line, but are not among the cheapest, so it’s best to check a few reviews before ordering.
Here is an example of a video where all Dylusions Acrylics are presented by the artist herself:
Reeves acrylics are especially popular among students because they offer strong vibrant colors for an economical price. There are 20 colors available, all in 200 ml tubes, all available for individual purchase. We should also mention their packs of 5, 10, 12 or 18 tubes, some of them designated with school usage in mind.
Of course, you can get all of their paints in smaller packages and there are also trend color packs containing four colors for mixing multitude shades without spending too much for larger sets. One of the most popular sets is acrylic metallics for painters who love to experiment with special effects.
While this Dutch based company exists since 1899, their acrylics are offered ‘only’ from 1970 on. There are several brands of acrylic paints in the Royal Talens family of artistic supplies:
Rembrandt has 75 high quality artists’ grade colors, defined by stability and consistency. They have uniformed gloss and drying time and belong among the best in the market.
Van Gogh has 40 different quality colors known by high drying time, offering faster work, but suitable for skilled artists. They are available in four gradations of opacity, being extremely versatile.
Talens Art creation is a brand with 38 colors, available in 75 ml and 200 ml tubes and 750 ml pots. You can buy them in different sets (8, 12 and 24) with 12 ml tubes, best performing on paper and canvas, but being good on everything without dust or grease. You can use them as they re or dilute them with water, what makes them even more versatile.
Formerly called Pip Seymour Extra Fine Acrylics is British manufacturer of Acrylic paints with a simple goal – to produce finest possible products. They managed to create 42 different colors based on finest pigments tested by numerous artists. They are known by intensity of hues, superb coverage and well-tested resistance. Some hues are truly special, like Oxford Bluestone or Verdaccio, all being available in 60 ml tubes or bigger jars ranging from 125 to 2500 ml) with pretty attractive prices (they offer four series with 1 being the least pricey and 4 being the most expensive) for wholesale orders and education institutions. They also offer gesso and primers acrylics.
If you wander what you get in the extra Series 4, you must think abut unique colors not available by any other brand, being available in only small batches and made with very special care from finest possible materials. Their crafty approach to the market is extremely well-excepted and we can expect more and more producers will go along the similar path creating more and more high quality acrylic paints for affordable price.
Winsor & Newton
This company offers two groups of acrylics in general: Professional for skilled craftsmen and Galeria with a good quality for affordable price. Professional Acrylic has 80 colors which offer a bit longer working time and don’t change their shades after drying. Galeria Acrylic has 60 colors, characterized by the lovely satin finish.
There are different sets available in both areas of Winsor & Newton Acrylic Paints with prices roughly ranging from 20 to 100 US dollars. In practical and attractive packages they make popular gifts for inspiring and experienced artists working with acrylics.
More than 200 purple shades with names, hexadecimal codes and RGB values
Welcome to the always growing list of purple colors with their names, HEX codes and RGB values. First of all, we have to offer some kind of definition of purple. For the majority of users, it’s a color made of blue and red, but scientists are much more strict. They, for instance, clearly distinguish between violet (another color between red and blue) and purple colors.
It is not our intention to go too much into the physical details with exact wavelengths and similar data, because the main purpose of this article is only to inform the readers about different purple shades (or, to be more specific, hues), with corresponding names, HTML codes and other info, useful to amateur or professional designers, stylists, programmers and just everybody who might be interested in naming a certain hue of purple color or finding more about its background.
Many colors, including purples, are connected with interesting stories, what gives us a lovely opportunity to present them in a readable, hopefully, amusing way with all the necessary data, which have been checked in numerous places, including dozens of international standards. Welcome in our exploration of the magic world of purple shades!
What the Word Purple Actually Means?
#800080 (128, 0, 128) Purple (HTML/CSS color)
#9B30FF (155, 48, 255) Purple 1
#912CEE (145, 44, 238) Purple 2
#7D26CD (125, 38, 205) Purple 3
#551A8B (85, 26, 139) Purple 4
All colors above are called purple, yet they don’t look the same. Similar is the story about the origin of word purple. It probably comes from Greek porphrya, used for the dye obtained from shellfish. It was used for coloring clothes even before Christ’s birth, but thanks to its cost (roughly measured by its weight in silver) mainly reserved for the wealthiest class. Romans changed the name to purpura and in the 7th century, it became purpul in Old English.
It took almost seven more centuries to use the word purpul / purple for the color, not just for a dye, as well.
#A020F0 (160, 32, 240) Purple (X11 color)
#9F00C5 (159, 0, 197) Purple (Munsell)
#85467B (133, 70, 123) Purple (AS 2700)
#4F284B (79, 40, 75) Purple (Murasaki)
#AFADD5 (175, 173, 213) Purple (BS 381)
As you already noticed, the same name is used for more or less similar colors between red and blue. Several standards were established and most of them are still in use in different areas of life. It’s obvious one single word is not enough to describe so different hues, so numerous adjectives were (and are!) used to further explain the color purple.
Different Purple Colors
Naming the colors with a dozen basic terms and set of adjectives is exactly what ISCC (Inter-Society Color Council) tried to establish in 1930. In following years the idea was adjusted and adapted until in 1955 NBS (National Bureau of Standards) published The Color Names Dictionary, where we can find colors like:
#602F6B ((96, 47, 107)) Deep Purple (ISCC-NBS) aka Imperial Purple
#401A4C (64, 26, 76) Very Deep Purple (ISCC-NBS)
You can imagine this is only a beginning of the list. Combinations of names and modifiers give us 267 categories, but we should know we can’t apply all modifiers to all hues. We will still present 25 different shades of purple according to just to this system.
#D5BADB (213, 186, 219) Very Light Purple (ISCC-NBS)
#B695C0 (182, 149, 192) Light Purple (ISCC-NBS)
#86608E (134, 96, 142) Moderate Purple (ISCC-NBS) aka Pomp and Power
#563C5C (86, 60, 92) Dark Purple (ISCC-NBS)
#301934 (48, 25, 52) Very Dark Purple (ISCC-NBS)
We could also include colors with adjective purplish as a modifier!
#D6CADD (214, 202, 221) Very Pale Purple (ISCC-NBS)
#AA98A9 (170, 152, 169) Pale Purple (ISCC-NBS)
#796878 (121, 104, 120) Grayish Purple (ISCC-NBS)
#50404D (80, 64, 77) Dark Grayish Purple (ISCC-NBS)
#291E29 (41, 30, 41) Blackish Purple (ISCC-NBS)
As we can expect, several combinations of modifiers lead to hues very close to gray, what is exactly the same situation as at watercolors, when we mix too many different hues – we’ll get brownish or grayish results.
But it soon became clear this system can’t offer enough, so enthusiasts from all over the world offered more alternatives. In the world of computers numbers were by far the most popular solution in naming the colors and purple is no exception (names are for CSS / HTML):
#9370DB (147, 112, 219) Medium Purple
#AB82FF (171, 130, 255) Medium Purple 1
#9F79EE (159, 121, 238) Medium Purple 2
#8968CD (137, 104, 205) Medium Purple 3
#5D478B (93, 71, 139) Medium Purple 4
Unfortunately, numbers don’t guarantee avoidance of confusion. Several companies and organizations suggested different standards. Less known VMG World Wide is only one, yet interesting example, naming similar colors with other numbers:
#7A5DC7 (122, 93, 199) Medium Purple (VMG) aka Purple Sage Bush
#4F2D7F (79,45,127) University of Central Arkansas
#461D7C (70, 29, 124) LSU (Louisiana State University) Purple
Certain purples became signature colors of internationally successful companies:
#660099 (102,0,153) Fedex
#FF0084 (255,0,132) Flickr
#FF00BF (255,0,191) Lyft
#E20074 (226,0,116) T-Mobile
#C822B0 (200,34,176) Univision
We can also find purple in professional sports. It symbolizes power and ambition. It fuses the energy of red with authority of blue. It is also closely associated with dignity, one of the most important elements in sport, where you should know ho to take wins and losses.
#552582 (85,37,130) Lakers Purple
#724C9F (114,76,159) Sacramento Kings
#1D1160 (29,17,96) Phoenix Suns
#280353 (40,3,83) Baltimore Ravens
#3B0160 (59,1,96) Minnesota Vikings
Source or location related to purple dye is another inspiration for naming this vibrant color.
Let’s point out only one of the purple hues in next set. Liseran purple got its name from alizarin, also called Turkey Red, the main ingredient of several dyes. Alizarin was originally made from the roots of flowers in the Madder family. It is the first natural pigment made synthetically (in 1869).
The most famous location by which a name of the color is given is very likely Magenta. It is named after the battle at Magenta, a town in Northern Italy. There French and Sardinian army won a battle against Austrians in 1859. It was a decisive battle, leading to important political changes. An aniline dye, discovered by French chemists Francois Emmanuel Verguin, discovered a few months earlier was named after that battle and here are several shades of Magenta:
As you already noticed among previous hues of purples, some of them look very reddish, while others are much more blueish. Everything goes because technically each color between pure red and pure blue belongs to the purple family. Magenta is a slightly different story. It’s defined as a color made by the equal amount of red and blue.
Thanks to different amounts of green we can still expect numerous variations of magenta. When we start to vary amounts of red/blue or even allow some deviations from equal amounts of both, we soon approach to hundreds and hundreds of magenta shades in this specific subgroup of purple colors as well!
In case you wonder how Printer’s Magenta got its name, you should know it’s one of three primary colors in a subtractive system and one of so-called three printer’s primaries (with yellow and cyan).
Purple Wall Paint
Are you thinking about making your home a bit extravagant, with a touch of glamour and eccentrics? Purple paint in recent years became one of the trends we simply can’t ignore anymore. Numerous different hues of purple paint colors and advanced materials made possible almost any vision of modern bedroom, kitchen, living room or bathroom. And purple looks great on furniture as well. Purple paint is not limited to interior only. You can use it for outside walls as well.
Here are some of the most popular paint colors of purple for walls:
To make a decision a bit easier for you, we decided to divide best commercial paints in purple tones into three groups and dark purple paint colors are the first one. You will see ten examples in each group, all with accompanying names, HTML and RGB codes and of course you’ll see the closest possible visual match a computer screen is able to deliver:
Most of the presented purple paints for walls are available at major retailers like Walmart, Target, Lowes or Home Depot, but you can also order them online directly from manufacturers or other distributors. Here we go with a next set of dark purples:
Pastel versions of purple color give relaxed feel, similar to blue colors, yet with warmer and always comfy overtone, so they can work great in bedrooms and living rooms, where blue is not among the top choices. So if you prefer lighter shades, you can still enjoy in lively hues of purple colors in many lovely paints, made by top brands like Benjamin Moore, Sherwin-Williams, Valspar or Pratt & Lambert:
Some of the names are pretty self-descriptive, but, as you can see, many names of these purple paints for walls don’t say much about the colors. They rather imply the feel which should be achieved by using the paints in action.
If pale purple paints are not energetic enough for you, we have a full set of 10 deep purples in the next section:
Deep purple paint
Deep purple paint colors are characterized by high levels of red and blue components, what make them strong and dominant in every room they are used. They are passionate with prestigious, almost royal impression and can work quite well as an addition to other, less powerful colored paints too.
Several paint manufacturers developed whole lines of bold colors with brave hues and sometimes with an addition of shiny golden or silver flakes or maybe another type of glitter, all supported with the newest technology, where only imagination is the limit.
#6B617A (107,97,122) Devine Starlight (Valspar)
#725980 (114, 89, 128) Plummy (Duron)
#64447c (100, 68, 124) Tulip Purple (Pratt & Lambert)
#4E4A5E (78, 74, 94) Deep Purple (Behr)
#5D5387 (93, 83, 135) Sultan Blue (Nippon Paint)
With these examples of best purple paints (according to several surveys), we are still not done. Most of the major manufacturers of paint offer samples and swatches to make your choice easier and this is still only the beginning because purple goes great with other colors too. The most popular combinations are with yellow and gray, but it is always an individual situation which should lead to your final decision.
Can we check the purples in more intimate area – in the beauty & fashion topic? Did you know, for instance, that purple is one of the most universal colors for lipstick, because it goes in majority of complexions? There’s even a saying – Purple in the new red for lipsticks!
Best Purple Colors for Lipsticks
We already know enough about purple to expect several groups of purple shades used for lipsticks and next picture shows exactly that. Some are more vibrant, other cooler, some more earthly, other almost psychedelic, yet each one of them serve its purpose, if used at the right time in the right place by the right person.
Dark purple lipstick
#4E2E57 Bossanova Purple (Golden Rose)
#42212C Orchid Ocean (Burt’s Bees)
#632F46 Mary (Mynena)
#540E32 Black Currant (L.A. Girl)
#672B4D Bewitching Bordeaux (L’Oreal)
Dark purple lipsticks are probably the best for darker skin. They work great for light brown complexion as well, but their use doesn’t stop there. Everybody who wants to achieve dramatic look of the lips, should consider at least trying to wear several different purple hues of lipsticks to see what works and at what occasions is best to wear it.
Dark plum lipstick
#9F344F Plum Noir (Bobbi Brown)
#912968 Hot Plum (Avon)
#540A2F Vampy Plum (Buxom)
#682E3C Insolent Plum (Estee Lauder)
#63253E Bruised Plum (Tom Ford)
Dark plum is another popular hue for lipsticks. As we can see, we have several different options to choose from and all of them are bold, rich, a bit saucier than the dark purples above, some verging of wine and others on berry tones.
Deep purple lipstick
#6B4653 Midnight Plum (Maybelline)
#481F2F Juniper Water (Burt’s Bees)
#461C1E Devilishly Deep Purple (ICE + JAM)
#622434 Night Viper (Georgio Armani)
#6D374E Sugar Plum Fairy (Wet ‘n Wild)
This set of purple lipsticks is a bit less popular at the moment, but probably the most classic and useful in the long term. While we are still dealing with very powerful shades, they look slightly calmer. The reason is probably their relatively natural look, in many cases closer to color brown.
Purple Matte Lipsticks
#5D507E Purple Affair (Ruby Kisses)
#481F3D Jinx / Witchberry Purple (Lime Crime)
#9B365E Plumeria (Anastasia Beverly Hills)
#681533 Cream Copenhagen (NYX)
#701C36 Ravin’ Raisin (Wet ‘n Wild)
In general we are always dealing with two kinds of lipsticks – cream and matte. Colors of creamy lipsticks are very hard to present on computer screen, so we opted for matte only. As seen above, all major families of purple colors are available in matte versions, which, by the way, are more stable, if we are looking at them strictly as part of the make-up.
#A5288C Fucshia in Rage (Yves Saint Laurent)
#732A57 Magenta Purple (Sugar)
#D85162 Mesmerizing Magenta (Maybelline)
#84003A Matte Magenta (Clinique)
#573043 Magenta Plum (Julep)
We have already said a few words about magenta and all presented lipsticks are rich in red and blue as the main components of color magenta, but manufacturers of lipsticks don’t necessary follow the 50 : 50 rule, what leads to very varying results, among everybody can find at least several interesting hues of magenta colored lipsticks for more or less special occasions.
#54396E Lavender Jam (Bite)
#730C75 Lavender Voltage (Maybelline)
#BB3C67 Lavender Lustre (Mirabella)
#8F87C2 Lavender (NYX)
#DA6EA2 Pinky Lavender (Golden Rose)
Lavender tones are among the most gentle ones of purple. They are very attractive and work best for younger and lighter skin. Don’t forget to combine it with proper (lively, with enough red yand yellow) make-up, if you don’t want to look tired or even ill.
Bright / Light Purple Lipsticks
#9A6DC2 Royal Purple (NYX)
#7F1F3B Wine Wave (Burt’s Bees)
#A3418A Brazen Berry (Maybelline)
#C71261 Fucshia Hype (Oriflame)
#B9729C Frozen Soft Purple (Golden Rose)
These bright and light purple tones of lipstick are another proof of versatility of color purple, which will very likely become even more popular in next years, partially thanks to bolder, more extravagant trends which are inevitable, partially thanks to the raising awareness of possibilities coming with proper cosmetics for each type of skin. The shades above are spanning very large spectrum of hues between red and blue, but each one of them will look slightly different depending on the wearer and other wearer’s makeup.
Purple Pink Lipsticks
#842A4E Lady and the Vamp (Wet N’ Wild)
#7D1955 Gemma (Stila)
#D76B9F Lavender Cosmo (Buxom)
#ED5995 La Diva (Chanel)
#C3566D Razzle Dazzle Rose (Too Faced)
Pink lipsticks are popular for decades and are topping the lists of popularity especially among youngest users. Purple pinks presented above are writing new rules – more enegetic, more vibrant, for women who are more self-dependent, self-confident and adventurous, yet still very feminine and sensual.
After 225 presented shades of purple we rest our case, but not for long. We have barely touched the largest family of purples – flowers. This is something for the near future. Stay tuned!
Here is the longest list of red colors of different shades, tones and tints in the world, all with their official / common / trivial names and HEX codes. They are organized by logical groups, depending on their similarities, name origins, or other common characteristics. Please note, in spite of careful checking of dozens of resources there may still be some discrepancies between this list (most complete in the WEB at the moment with 445 named red colors and still rising) and other respectful sites, dealing with colors and design.
Our basic aim is to provide a fast comparison between red colors for a wide variety of users, being artists, designers or just curious minds. If you find this list useful, please share it with your friends, readers of your blog or any other people who may find it interesting. Color red, after all, is the most intense color and actually the oldest in all known languages (right behind black and white, which are, technically speaking not real colors). The red color is so old, in some of the languages (like Latin) the word for ‘colored’ and ‘red’ is actually the same.
#FF0000 Red 1 (Safe 16 SVG Hex 3)
#EE0000 Red 2 (Hex 3)
#CD0000 Red 3
#8B0000 (Dark) Red 4 (SVG)
#FE2712 Red (RYB)
As you probably already know, there are several standards dealing with Web colors and even at so basic color as red is, we soon bump into the lack of expressions. Adding a number to the name is a simple and effective solution, but doesn’t give any additional info to the end user. From the user’s point of view, an adjective like dark gives much more sense than number 4. Here is a group of such reds:
#ED1C24 Red (Pigment)
#E72512 Pure Red
#BC243C True Red (Pantone)
#FF0033 Bright Red (Safe Hex3)
#922A31 Bright Red (Resene)
While the names are relatively explicit, we still can’t seriously work without their HEX values.
#BD4255 International Light Red
#F70000 Luminous Red
#AB4E52 Moderate Red
#E58E73 Middle Red (Crayola)
#D92121 Maximum Red (Crayola)
Darker tones of red are verging to the purple or brown very soon.
#5C0923 Very Deep Red
#FF355E Radical Red
#722F37 Dark Red aka Wine (ISCC NBS)
#3F1728 Very Dark Red
#3A181A Rustic Red
Unfortunately, these names rely too much on personal preferences and lack of absolute values, what could help to standardize a perception of a specific color in all its shades, tones, tints etc. There were several attempts to make a list of colors where everybody understands what color is associated with each specific name. These attempts were only partly successful. First of all, we are dealing with word meanings, which can be similarly subjective like the perception of colors. Then there were different interests (and powers) of groups who tried to establish the standards. And there was, of course, nonstop progress in technology. If at certain moments computers displayed only 16 different colors, today’s graphic cards show more than four million colors and they would produce even more, but the human eye can hardly recognize an even small portion of them.
#F2003C Red (Munsell)
#EE204D Red (Crayola)
#C40233 Red (NCS)
#EF3340 Red (Pantone)
#E60026 Red (G&S … Rosa Gallego & Juan Carlos Sanz)
Now it’s clear the word red simply can’t describe the color because there are so many nuances. There are few other words with essentially the same meaning, often with vague origins, sometimes coming from raw materials, sometimes mistranslated, and always leading to more variety at naming, what gives more opportunity at the description on one hand but also more confusion on the other.
Here is a family of carmine colors:
#FF0038 Carmine Red
#801522 Carmine (Sherwin-Williams)
#D70040 Rich Carmine aka Carmine (M&P)
#A9203E Deep Carmine
Carmine color got its name after several types of insects (cochineal) which were powdered and boiled in sodium or ammonia carbonate or cooked in boiled water with the addition of different chemicals. It’s pretty clear different shades of carmine came into the market way before this color actually got any kind of official name.
#EF2929 Scarlet Red 1
#CC0000 Scarlet Red 2 aka Boston University Red
#A40000 Scarlet Red 3 aka Dark Candy Apple Red
#560319 Dark Scarlet
If we can say carmine is slightly purplish, scarlet is more inclined to the orange, what means it has some yellow instead of blue in the mix. You can bet there are more than five shades of scarlet, and we are continuing with another set with names of various origins.
#8C1717 Scarlet (Netscape)
#FF3300 Scarlet (Websafe Hex 3) aka Nectarine
#FD0E35 Scarlet aka Tractor Red aka Torch Red (Crayola, since 1998)
#FC2847 Scarlet (Crayola, since 2004)
#CD392A Scarlet (AS 2700)
By the way AS stands for Australian Standard. Yes, they have slightly different perception of scarlet Down Under! It’s only fair to also mention scarlett with a double t before we continue with the family of crimson colors.
#7E2530 Scarlett (Resene)
#78184A Crimson (NBS ISCC TC) aka Deep Purplish Red
#711922 Crimson Red
#582124 Burnt Crimson
The origin of word crimson is similar as the word carmine – it comes from the name of the insect Kermes vermilio (please note: there is a family of vermilion colors too and the list is coming soon!), which was originally used as the source of dye. Today it is generally accepted the word for a family of strong red colors with a pinch of blueish tone. In general, it has more of the blue than carmine.
#C63927 Vermilion (RAL Color Standard)
#D9381E Medium Vermilion (Plochere)
#E34234 Vermilion (Cinnabar)
#CC474B English Vermilion (Crayola)
And there is also a shade of red called Vermillion (double l) with HEX value #F4320C listed in XKCD list of colors. XKCD is a Randall Munroe’s Web comic and one of his online projects was a color name survey with around quarter of a million participants who suggested (after some heavy filtering) 954 names for different colors, including Vermillion.
How About HEX Values for Red Pigments?
According to the origin of pigment, trade route or tradition of usage, many types of red became strongly associated with certain countries. English Vermilion above is only one of them. We have also mentioned Spanish Red (Rojo) aka Red (G&S – after Rosa Gallego and Juan Carlos Sanz) with HEX code #E60026.
#E0162B Old Glory Red
#D43D1A English Red
#AB4B52 English Red (X11)
#FF5C5C Indian Red
#B94E48 (Deep) Indian Red (Crayola) aka (Deep) Chestnut (Crayola)
Old Glory is a nickname of the American flag and now you have the HTML code for the red color in it. All English and Indian reds are a different story. They are colors of soil or dirt from India, rich with iron oxide. There are several iron oxides, varying in reddish and brownish tones and the percentage of these oxides is varying too, so there are several shades with similar or even the same name.
#CD5C5C Indian Red (SVG)
#FF6A6A Indian Red 1
#EE6363 Indian Red 2
#CD5555 Indian Red 3
#8B3A3A Indian Red 4
Let’s have a few words abut Indian Red (again – called after the color of the soil in India). Crayola produces this color from 1958, but in 1999 after a suggestion of worrying parents believing this name suggest the color of the skin of American Indians, changed the name into Maroon, so you’ll find this very same color in the boxes with color pencils with this name. It was also named Vermont maple syrup in a special limited edition.
We have already mentioned insects, by which carmine and crimson colors got their names. Several of that pigments came to Europe after Spain conquered Mexico and introduced kermes insects to the dye market. Thanks to that fact and overall importance of Spanish traders we have colors named after this country. Similar stories are explaining the name of Persian reds in the next set of red colors.
#D10047 Spanish Carmine
#E51A4C Spanish Crimson
#CC3333 Persian Red
#4F212A Persian Red (Resene)
#683332 Persian Plum
The most known color in next group is probably Chinese Red, originally made from powdered cinnabar and from 8th (!) century from a synthesis of mercury and sulfur. Considering numerous factors affecting the tone of final dye, it should be not surprising if we find several relatively different shades with the same name – Chinese Red – in our case displayed only with one example.
#9B3D3D Mexican Red
#A91101 Turkey Red
#9D2933 Japanese Carmine
#AA381E Chinese Red aka China Red
#C54F33 Trinidad Red
Just like countries, other places helped to name a wide variety of red shades as well. The first presented family is Venetian red. These tones were originally achieved by iron oxide pigment, in last decades made by synthesis. A pigment is associated with two important ports: Venice (surprise, surprise) and Sinop, Turkey, thus being called sinopia as well. Venetian red was for centuries one of the most starting points for painting skin (especially among Rennesance artists). The desired tone of the skin was achieved by mixing sinopia with lime white (approximately two parts of Venetian red and one part of Lime white).
#C80815 Venetian Red
#5B1F22 Venetian Red (Resene)
#B33B24 Dark Venetian Red (Crayola)
#CC553D Venetian Red (Crayola)
#E6735C Light Venetian Red (Crayola)
Tuscany is a region in Italy, but Tuscan Red has nothing to do with it. It’s actually kind of a signature color of Pennsylvania, USA, where it was used for coloring passenger cars at the railroad. Similarly, the closely related color came into use in Canada and Australia. The color is originally based on iron oxides (family of Indian Reds), but due instability dyes based on aniline became the standard.
#7C3030 Tuscan Red
#AD6242 Tuscany (Resene)
#A67B5B Tuscan Tan
As you noticed, all the most popular tones of Tuscan red possess pretty high values of green, what relates the whole family with brown colors. There is also a well-known color Tuscan Brown with HEX code #6F4E37. We’ll continue with Italy and several antique / historical places, where specific types of reds got their names.
#9E3332 Milano Red
#940000 Pompeii Red
#9E1316 Spartan Crimson
#99002 Tyrian Red aka Tyrian Purple
Most of the presented names are self-explanatory, maybe we should just clarify the name Falu Red, named after Falun, Sweden, where well-known copper mine is located. You’ll also notice Kobe, Japan, for most of us best known by the most famous beef in the world. Bordeaux, on the other hand, is famous due their (red!) wine. We’ll deal with wine related reds soon. Or maybe a bit later – there are many groups to explore out there!
#801818 Falu Red
#CB6F4A Red Damask
Some places are so well-known by rd color, different paint makers started naming their paints after them. The problem is each one of them interpret red differently. One such problem is Sedona:
#AC614F Sedona Clay (Benjamin Moore)
#AF663F Sedona Clay (Evonik-Degussa)
#C19982 Sedona Sand (Kelly-Moore)
#DF9371 Sedona Stone (Nippon Paint)
#452927 Sedona Bronze (General Motors)
Considering the importance of red, definitely the most powerful color in the spectrum, we can expect it as an official color or part of official palette at important organizations. Let’s start with universities:
#CB333B Louisiana Tech University
#990000 USC (University of South Carolina) Cardinal Red aka Crimson Tide (University of Alabama) aka OU Crimson Red (University of Oklahoma)
#B70101 University of Wisconsin–Madison aka Badger Red
#C8102E University of Huston
#B31B1B Cornell Red aka Carnelian
It’s not surprising to find out several universities use the same tone of red like we can see at code #990000, sometimes also named Crimson Red (we have already presented different color with the same name and different HEX value) or Stizza. The word stizza is of Italian origin and it essentially means anger. We’ll deal with red shades related with emotions later.
#8C1515 Cardinal Red (Stanford University)
#BB0000 Ohio State University Red
#CC0033 Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey Red
#7B1113 (University of Philippines) UP Maroon aka Tibetan Red
#D9004C UA (University of Arizona) Red
One of the reds above is called Maroon, after the marron, what is a French word for chestnut. We’ll take some time for the family of maroon colors, brownish red tones, later, where we’ll deal with red in nature, especially in the world of plants. Let’s complete the series of reds, assigned with universities.
#E8000D KU Crimson (University of Kansas)
#841617 Oklahoma Crimson
#AF002A Alabama Crimson
#D3003F Utah Crimson (University of Utah)
#C90016 Harvard Crimson
We can find the color for Harvard Crimson Red under #A51C30 value too. Some of the universities use more than one tone of red for their logotypes, team dresses, etc., what means you should check at their official sites before using any of this information. We will continue with another set of red colors, this time, assigned with authority in general.
As you know, red is associated with aggression and (mostly) masculine power. Red, scarlet, carmine and crimson were colors worn by important and influential people many centuries before these colors got their names. Let’s introduce the first set of reds with names suggesting an absolute power:
#ED2939 Imperial Red
#901E1D Insignia Red
#C13311 Regency Red
#853E3C Monarch (BS 4800)
In the case you don’t know BS stands for British Standard. Being among royalties and other authorities, let’s look at church dignitaries too. There is a whole family of red shades named after cardinals (we have actually already seen some of them), who were among first who wore gowns of such colors. Please be aware red color was not allowed for regular people in many cultures. You’ll soon see how is this color popular among car makers and in traffic in general.
#C41E3A Cardinal (Maerz and Paul)
#8A244E Cardinal (Resene)
#9D101C Cardinal (Sherwin-Williams)
#D41F18 Ford Cardinal Red
#B5342D General Motors Cardinal Red
The color red is strongly related to several brands in automobile industry and Ferrari is among most popular ones. Apparently, this is not enough because the manufacturers decided to associate a specific color for racing cars coming from Italy. Abarth, Alfa Romeo, Ferrari, Lancia and Maserati all used this color, which was adopted in honor of Prince Scipione Borghese who won the race from Peking to Paris in 1907 in – red colored Ferrari.
#FF2800 Ferrari Red
#D40000 Rosso Corsa
#F24816 Rail Red aka Azo Orange
#A0333A Aircraft Red aka CARC (Civil Aviation Regulatory Commission) Aircraft Red, ANA 619 aka International Red
#AF1E2D Sign Red
Ferrari Red is associated with #FF1C00 as well. Traffic is of course closely related to danger, signals, safety, prevention and exclusion.
We find it in several standardized tones of red, which can be, despite different HTML / RGB / HEX codes pretty similar to each other.
#A6001A W3-Highway-Red aka DoT Highway Red
#BD1E24 W3-Safety-Red aka OSHA Safety Red
#9D3C3F 11086 DoT Highway Red (Federal standard 595)
#9E3A40 11105 OSHA Safety Red, DoT Red (Federal standard 595)
#B04243 11120 OSHA Safety Red (Federal standard 595)
According to different standards and acceptable tolerance we can find some of the mentioned colors with same names and different HTML codes. We have similar situation in the next group too. By the way: RAL (Reichs-Ausschuß für Lieferbedingungen und Gütesicherung – Imperial Commission for Delivery Terms and Quality Assurance) is a well-known and widely used European color standard.
#BA312B Signal Red (AS 2700)
#A02128 Signal Red (RAL 3001)
#E03C31 tudi #E23D28 CG Red (Coast Guard)
#A93D43 Coast Guard Buoy Red
#E62200 Coast Guard Red #40
For Coast Guard we actually have at least two different hues of red, apart from #E03C31 they use #E23D28 too. The power of color red was always present as dominant, being able to control the people and organisations. We are not surprised finding it transformed into the world of giant corporations as well. Some of presented HTML codes are simulated hex values.
#D50F25 tudi HEX: #EA4335 Google Red
#C4302B Youtube Red
#CA0002 CNN Red
Google Red is known for another HEX code: #EA4335. Red color is extremely important in all areas, where we want to focus attention of the observer on something specific. While human eye yellow is most to yellow color, we use red for another reason, based on hard science. John William Strutt, more known as Lord Rayleigh found out it’s red which thanks to its highest wavelength in the visual spectra disperse least of all colors. This guarantees we’ll see red signs best of all.
#B44441 Post Office Red
#CE2029 Fire Engine Red
#FF5333 Safety Cone
#C1121C Traffic Red (RAL 3020)
We all know how we use red color to mark important facts (underlined in red, being in red numbers) and the names in the next set of reds show exactly that.
#C51F1F Find The Company Red
#883531 Totem Pole
#AD522E Red Stage
It really doesn’t matter if we want to warn or attract somebody, red is here to give you a heads up. We often say it’s a warm color, but in sometimes it is more than warm – it’s hot!
#AB2524 Flame Red
#F60018 Laured aka Torch
We have more reds (although quite brownish and purplish) with names associated with heat, flames and fire:
#633528 Hairy Heath
#8F3F2A Fire (Resene)
Before we turn towards to the brown side let’s see some more!
#F9423A Warm Red (Crayola)
#FF3855 Sizzling Red (Crayola)
#FF404C Sunburnt Cyclops
#B22222 Fire Brick (SVG)
The family of fire brick colors belongs to the scarlet reds and their name came from the color of bricks, which were (and still are) made in a fire.
#FF3030 Fire Brick 1
#EE2C2C Fire Brick 2
#CD2626 Fire Brick 3
#8B1A1A Fire Brick 4
#8E2323 Fire Brick 5
While we are dealing with buildings, we should also mention some red paints.
Popular red paints
One of the oldest red paints used by construction workers is definitely red. In America red paint is especially popular paint for barns. There are several reasons for that:
It makes a nice contrast with white farm buildings.
It was traditionally made of flex-seed oil mixed with rust (iron oxide), inexpensive and effective protection against moist and fungi.
When first commercial paints came to the market in 19th century red was the cheapest.
Today we have many lovely alternatives and new barns are not necessarily painted red, but many producers still offer red paints with barn in the name:
#A5554E (165,85,78) Red Barn (Web)
#7C0A02 (124,10,2) Barn Red (Web)
#733D39 (115,61,57) Barn Red (Behr)
#8A5958 (138,89,88) Barn Door (Olympic)
#905959 (144,89,89) Barn Door (Porter Paints)
Here we can compare two web safe barn red colors with eight (altogether) paints mad by commercial paint-makers. The are relatively different but always more on the brownish, burnt side of the spectrum-
#7F453C (127,69,60) Red Barn (Sherwin-Williams)
#822A36 (130,42,54) Barn Red (Ralph Lauren)
#842928 (132,41,40) Pottery Barn (Benjamin Moore)
#945B58 (148,91,88) Barn Door (Taubmans)
#AF5453 (175,84,83) Barn Red (Dulux Paint)
Don’t forget – red color was one of the most obvious signs of success and having one’s own barn was definitely something to be proud off. Similar is true for cottages – today wo don’t look at them as cheap homes, but rather as extras for different purposes. Here are several examples of paints, named after typical red or reddish cottages:
As you can see, these cottage red colors tend towards pink spectrum of colors. On the other hand we also have a selection with relatively large amounts of yellow, thus being more orange or brown:
#682A27 (104,42,39) Cottage Red (Benjamin Moore)
#855B51 (133,91,81) Jekyll Club Cottage Brick (Valspar Paint)
#876D65 (135,109,101) Lincoln Cottage Brown (Valspar Paint)
#A85846 (168,88,70) Cottage Spice (Diamond Vogel)
#C5826C (197,130,108) Cottage Clay (Behr)
Being the sign of nobility and prestige, it’s only natural to expect red colors named after precious or semiprecious stones.
#9B111E Ruby Red
#841B2D Antique Ruby aka Deep Red
#D10056 Rubine Red
Ruby ( a chemical mixture of aluminum oxide with microelements, namely chromium) is by far the most popular red color related to minerals.
#AA4069 Ruby (Crayola)
#843F5B Ruby (BS 381)
#711521 Pearl Ruby Red
#9C2542 (approx) Big Dip O’Ruby (Metallic FX Crayola)
(Of course BS stands for British Standards.) With such popularity, we can only expect to have several ruby colors in numerous existing standards. Garnet, geranium, and other gemstones are less known and standardization is much easier, although far from being simple.
Please note, all metallic colors (like Big Dip O’Ruby) are only HEX approximations because currently there is no mechanism to display exact metallic effect on computer screens.
#943543 Garnet (Pantone)
#BC3F4A Geranium aka Sanguine aka Strong Red
#933D41 Smokey Topaz
#832A0D Smokey Topaz (Crayola)
All kinds of chemical substances can be red or reddish colored, and some of the chemicals gave their names to specific red tints. In all cases, the color is dependent on the ion state in the substance. Iron, for instance, can be of reddish or greenish color, depending on the electron structures of the compounds (that’s why most of the beer and wine bottles are brownish or greenish).
#E30022 Cadmium Red
#E3170D Cadmium Red Deep
#FF030D Cadmium Red Light
#71006A Cobalt Red Violet
The most known, yet far from being among most popular substances is rust. When iron is exposed to oxygen and if there’s some water (vapors are enough) it changes color from shiny silverish to reddish brown. Here are some colors, related to that tones.
#D0674F Red Dust
#DA2C43 Rusty Red
#B47360 Rust Red
#E44C9A Pantone Uncoated Rhodamine Red
The most known metal of red color is copper and we didn’t forget to include few examples of these shades of red as well. To be honest, most of us would put all of them into browns.
#CB6D51 Copper Red
#6C322E Kenyan Copper
#6E3D34 Metallic Copper
#663334 Red Oxide
#5D1F1E Red Oxide (Resine)
Most types of soil are brown and some of them can have pretty intensively reddish tones. In the majority of cases, the reason is iron oxide, which is roughly just a fancy name for rust.
#8E3928 Red Prairie
#9A150E Red Ochre
#FF5721 Flesh Ochre
#E2725B Terra Cotta
#CC4E5C Dark Terra Cotta
We could go on and on with soils, but’ it’s probably better to save colors like Prairie Sand (HEX #883C32) or Clay Pot (HEX #9A4A33) for a separate article, dedicated to color brown. While we slowly moved from inorganic to organic nature, we can now continue with plants, known by red color. Or – better – with tones of red, named after different plants.
#673F45 Beetroot (California paint)
#9B2335 Chili Pepper
While everybody knows how a beetroot or paprika, two typically red plants look, we mostly associate word bittersweet with taste or feelings. We’ll meet a family of reds related with feeling later, but at this moment only say we are not dealing with anything abstract. Bittersweet is just another word for bitter nightshade, also called climbing nightshade, poisonberry, felonwood (Solanum dulcamara) with characteristic red berries. This color can qualify among orange too.
How about another set of plants, associated with color red?
#672F30 Japanese Maple
Plants above have red blossoms, berries, leaves, wood or some combination of above. To make a comparison, we present a photo of crabapple from Pixabay.
We are not finished yet.
#BE0032 Pimento aka Vivid Red (Resene) aka Crimson Glory
#5B342E Redwood (Resene)
Did you know pimento is a kind of paprika? Can you see the similarities of Pohutukawa red color with pohutukawa tree’s blossoms?
Ande there is more!
#8A2A52 Rosebud Cherry
We could go on and on with red colors related with plants, especially if we include all orange, pink, purple or brown shades, but instead of that let’s focus only on ones that are the most known by signature red color. Tomato, a so-called fruit-vegetable and close relative of before mentioned nightshade is definitely one of them.
#FF6347 Tomato 1 (SVG)
#EE5C42 Tomato 2
#CD4F39 Tomato 3
#8B3626 Tomato 4
#9C322E Tomato Red
We should not forget a rhubarb, which is in many areas very popular in the kitchen too.
#AD071D Rhubarb Red
#7E3949 Dulux Australia Ripe Rhubarb
#AB555F Rhubarb (Behr 130D-5)
#BF4F4F Benjamin Moore Rhubarb
#77202F Rhubarb (Pantone)
Maroon is kind of chestnut, a tasty and edible seed with characteristic reddish brown or brownish red color. This family of colors, popular at all kinds of paints, including hair colors, is so abundant, we can present two full sets of five colors with an addition of another family of closely related colors called after chestnut.
#B03060 Maroon (X11) aka Rich Maroon
#FF34B3 Maroon 1
#EE30A7 Maroon 2
#CD2990 Maroon 3
#8B1C62 Maroon 4
#800000 Maroon (16 SVG)
#421814 Maroon (W3-ANA-510)
#5A3839 Royal Maroon
#AD4379 Mystic Maroon
#915F6D Aztec Maroon
#C32148 Bright Maroon aka Maroon (Crayola)
#412327 Maroon (Resene)
#7E354D Velvet Maroon
#402327 Maroon (Resene)
#691F01 Maroon 5
In the next set, you’ll find a strange word catawba. This is not a maroon or chestnut, but sort of grape, used for jams, jelly, juice, and of course wines, which deserve another section of colors just for themselves. We included it to present a related color from the same group.
#954535 Chestnut (Maerz and Paul)
#C34A2C Chestnut Red
#633A34 Chestnut Brown (RAL 8015)
#986960 Dark Chestnut
Before we make a move to fruits, let’s take a moment for another very special group of reddish brown tones called after the mahogany, name for the wood of different species of trees (Swietenia family), including hybrids, being different quality, and, as far this article is concerned, of different colors. Here are some of them, and we’ll meet some more in the post about shades of brown.
#CD4A4C Mahogany Red
#483230 Mahogany (Resene)
#79443B Mahogany (NBS/ISCC TC)
#CA3435 Mahogany (Crayola)
The red color is an attractive one, although most of the insects can’t see it. On the other hand, birds and mammals love it and plants developed many gorgeous fruits that attract animals, including people, who spread the seeds in exchange of beautiful (and often very tasteful) fruits. As you’ll see, some fruits are so popular they created special categories of red colors named after for them. Here are several groups of red colors named after various fruits:
#FF9966 Atomic Tangerine
Just like before, there are a lot of tones inclining to pink, purple, orange or brown color palettes, depending on the percentage of yellow and blue in the mixture.
Maybe we can clarify a bit about French raspberry. There are numerous raspberries all belonging to the genus Rubus. Some are named after colors, like blue, black, yellow and even golden, but we’ll not go into details. We’d rather add there are no species named French raspberry! The name of the color, in fact, came from French raspberry syrup of distinctive vivid pinkish red color.
#5E2A40 Mulberry (Resene)
#C54B8C Mulberry (Crayola)
#55141C Passion Fruit
At this point, we can ask what’s the difference between plums and prunes? Well, the latin name for plums is Prunus (the same family as cherries, which will soon come in the spotlight), so it’s logic to expect we are dealing with the same kind of fruit. A prune is actually a dried plum and this can be seen as their colors above and below.
#F5785A Pummelo Pulp
#B42041 Raspberry Red
The least known fruit above is probably Shiraz. It’s a sort of a grape, from which red wine is made. It originates in France but is grown in many areas of the world, varying in taste, depending on the climate and soil. There are several hard to prove myths about the relation of grape called Shiraz with Shiraz, the capital of Persian empire (today’s Iran) or Syracuse (Syrah is another name for that grape).
Is it finally time to present a strawberry?
#D14152 Strawberry Red
#FC5A8D Strawberry (Crayola)
#CD5D34 Tangerine (Resene)
#FF9980 Vivid Tangerine (Crayola)
While everybody knows strawberry, many people don’t distinguish between tangerine and mandarin. Tangerine has a bit smaller and prolongated shape of fruits, it has thicker skin, yet both taste pretty similar. As you can see colors named by different standards don’t always look the same. Even more – those standards are not fixed either. Knowing the HEX (HTML) code is probably the best option.
#F2473F Watermelon Pulp
#FF43A4 Wild Strawberry
#FC6C85 Wild Watermelon
#FD5B78 Wild Watermelon (Crayola)
We can find a color named wineberry with HEX code #533039 too. One of the most popular fruits of the world is an apple and we can find it in several tones of red, yellow or green color. Let’s see the red part of the family for now.
#9D1309 Red Delicious Apple
#FF0800 Candy Apple Red aka Apple-Candy Red
#A9373D Candy Apple Red (Behr 8371)
#E2062C Medium Candy Apple Red
#D66F62 Fuji Apple
Cherry has even more types of red colors. We have found enough for two whole sets of cherry red colors.
#B3446C Cherry (NBS/ISCC TC) aka Irresistible
#C41C22 Cherry aka Post Office Red (BS 381) BS … British Standard
#DA2647 Cherry (Crayola)
#8B4131 Dark Cherry aka Russet aka Monarch (BS 381)
#FF0047 Cherry Red
#6C132B Dark Cherry Red
#330000 Dark Cherry Red (Safe Hex3)
#A02422 Bing Cherry
#790604 Krylon Cherry Red
Cerise if French for cherry and we have two whole sets of cerise colors too. But for the moment we conclude at 300 shades of red!
#DA3287 (Deep) Cerise (Crayola)
#E23D80 Cerise Red
#EC3B83 Cerise Pink
#DA3163 Cerise Magenta (Crayola)
It is not our intention to present all the subtle difference between cherries and cerise. For our main purpose, it’s probably enough to say that cerise colors have a larger percent of blue, what means they are in general slightly inclined to purple / violet spectra.
#9F1F4C Medium Cerise
#DA1D81 Vivid Cerise
#E8A2CE Very Pale Cerise
#F400A1 Hollywood Cerise aka Fashion Fuchsia
#BB3385 Strong Cerise
Cerise colors are often similar with Fuchsia colors, so it’s only fair to proceed with flowers, which gave their name to several reds as well.
We have already mentioned several red flowers, which are a special story for themselves, because they can’t be seen by the majority of insects, otherwise the best pollinators of all. This means red flowers should rely on their smell or other pollinators, like tropical birds or wind.
#A95249 Apple Blossom (Resene)
#FFB7C5 Cherry Blossom Pink
#A84F51 Gerbera Daisy (Laura Ashley 44-23)
#D77A02 Wild Orchid
#87141F Poppy Flower
#853534 Tall Poppy
A family of roses, where we can also find white and yellow sorts, are so abundant, we constructed two groups just for this undoubtedly the most popular flower in the world.
#FF033E American Rose
#480607 Bulgarian Rose
#D3545F Rose (RAL)
#FF5050 Rose (Crayola)
#D3A194 Rose (Resene)
Considering the fact breeders create new sorts of roses all the time, this family could expand anytime soon.
#905D5D Bois De Rose
#C48379 Grecian Rose
#AC512D Rose of Sharon (Resene)
#ED0A3F Smell the Roses (Red)
#532934 Black Rose
How about animals? Red is a color of aggression, attention, and attraction. It is well distributed through birds, especially males, who try to show themselves in best light in front of females, it is pretty popular at fish, color of warning in the world of insects (who are trying to warn especially birds) but relatively rare among terrestrial animals, where it’s much easier to find more earth tones, like reddish brown or brownish red.
#F58F84 Ibis Wing Color
#B13F44 Ladybud Red (Benjamin Moore)
#913228 Red Kite
#7D4138 Red Robin
Color puce red has an interesting story as well. It’s a color of stains remaining on the sheets of the person, who was a victim of flea bites. Even washing couldn’t remove them. In many areas of the world fleas are actually very much still a present threat, so we should not be surprised to find so many types of puce color.
#CC8899 Puce (NBS/ISCC TC)
#A95C68 Puce (M&P)
#4E1609 Puce (Pourpre color list)
#4F3A3C Puce (Pantone)
#ECC3BF Piglet Snout
There is a widely spread misconception about corals belonging to the world of plants. They are actually animals (invertebrates) and their skeletons are the essential component of famous coral reefs, where so many plants and animal species live. Characteristic color of corals is somewhere between red, pink and orange, thus being seen as girlish for many years.
#FF7F50 Coral (SVG)
#FF7256 Coral 1
#EE6A50 Coral 2
#CD5B45 Coral 3 aka Dark Coral
#8B3E2F Coral 4
We have designated coral as a girlish color. Salmon, although of pretty similar tones, is completely different story. If a certain piece of cloth is colored with one of the colors from the next family, it will be very likely described as pink if it’s for women or salmon, if it’s for men.
#FA8072 Salmon (SVG)
#FF8C69 Salmon 1
#EE8262 Salmon 2
#CD7054 Salmon 3
#8B4C39 Salmon 4
#FF91A4 Salmon (Crayola)
#FF3333 Nova Scotia Salmon (Safe Hex3)
#FF6666 Seattle Salmon (Safe Hex3)
#F1444A Salmon Pearl (Crayola)
#F77D64 Salmon Red (BS4800) aka Lobster aka Azalea
#FFA07A Light Salmon (SVG)
#EE9572 Light Salmon 2
#CD8162 Light Salmon 3
#8B5742 Light Salmon 4
#E9967A Dark Salmon
Red is an appetite stimulant and red food color is a mandatory part of many meals. It is also very popular in packaging, in a tablecloth and even in restaurant logotypes. We listed several families of reds named after different kinds of food or spice.
#FFC1CC Bubble Gum
#8D4338 Red Gum
#C73F17 Chili Powder
#FC1501 Gummi Red
#B13E0F Kidney Bean
#DA614E Jelly Bean
#7D0541 Plum Pie
We are not over yet. Apart from the food, we find red appealing at drinks too. Sauces, cocktails, and beverages are another interesting groups to know.
#FD3A4A Red Salsa (Crayola)
Moccaccino is misspelled for Mochaccino and sangria is a mixed drink with red wine base, where different fruits, and maybe some additional sweetener and other drinks are present. By the way, you can find color named Sangria with hex code #92000A too. In Spanish sangria means blood. We’ll devote a whole group to blood red colors later. Let’s use the drink made from wine to wine red colors.
Yes, we finally came to one of the largest groups of red tones – with names coming from wines.
#5E2028 Wine Red (RAL 3005)
#990012 (Garnet) Red Wine
#955264 Vin Rouge
#AC1E44 French Wine (Lie de Vin)
#881824 Plascon Red Red Wine
There are also codes #7F1A1A, #85274E, #580B1C for color called Wine Red. Vin Rouge, of course, means red wine in French (yet French Wine has its own color).
#800020 Burgundy aka Ox Blood
#652525 Burgundy (Resene)
#9F1D35 Vivid Burgundy
#43302E Old Burgundy
#73343A Merlot (Resene)
#7F1734 Claret (XONA)
#8B3F3F Claret H8 (Rodda)
#6E2233 Claret (Resene)
#562627 AMC Claret
#673147 Claret (NBS ISCC/TC) aka Wine Dregs
*Colortrend Pinot #7D5E67
*Pinot Noir (Sico 6039-41) #BDA3A5
*Cabernet (Benjamin Moore) #6C5B65
*Cabernet (Alcro) #230411
*Raspberry Wine (Pantone) #B63157
Here we have exactly 445 codes for different red shades, organised in groups by their name. If you think we are over, you are wrong – we will continue adding them and the number 500 is not too far away … See ya!
If you want to know what colors make blue, you may get two very different answers. The first one is simple: you can’t make blue because it’s one of the three so-called primaries. The second is a bit more complicated, but actually very interesting and much closer to the truth. So if you want to start an interesting conversation about art, graphic design or are just being curious, read on to find out how to make the color blue!
The Basic Color Wheel Explained
There are numerous theories about the color, but most of us are familiar with at least one – the color wheel, developed in 1666 by Sir Isaac Newton (he actually became a Sir almost 40 years after that). This theory explains all the colors by three basic, primary hues: red, blue and yellow. None of them can be made from other colors and every other hue you might imagine can be made by mixing two or all three primaries in right proportions.
This color wheel can be presented with a simple diagram, a color wheel of primary colors:
The so-called secondary color wheel or 6 color wheel looks like this:
Sometimes it is also called a complementary color wheel because the colors, lying on the opposites of the circle make complementaries to each other. As you already noticed, there are three other colors added – green as a mix of yellow and blue, orange as a mix of red and yellow, and violet (purple) as a mix of blue and red.
We can proceed with a tertiary color wheel, a color wheel with 12 colors:
Here we got six additional colors (blue-purple, blue-green, yellow-green, yellow-orange, red-orange, and red-purple) all being made by mixing one primary and one secondary color. It’s obvious we can go on and on with that, making more and more new colors. With an addition of white, gray and black we got different tints, tones, and shades as well, what leads us to next color wheel:
This kind of mixing colors is called additive color model, but in practice, we often use a subtractive color model as well. This one is based on a different, although still very logical premises. It starts with a white light, which is, as you probably already know, made of different colors. These can be individually seen thanks to the dispersion.
Each color has its own wavelength and each has different speed when passing the media (in the example above, it’s a glass prism). Instead of the white mixture, we are able to see its components and with appropriate filters, we can eliminate certain colors to see just one or more of them. The printing process at computer printing is based on this idea.
We start with a white sheet of paper and then apply series of filters, so only desired color(s) can be seen. Filters in common printing are called cyan, yellow and magenta. All of them are colors already but are used in mixtures to create hues that could be seen as the end result. You probably already heard of CMY abbreviation, called after first letters of these color filters, and we’ll get back to it later.
So What Two Colors Make Blue?
If we want to print blue color, we need two filters: cyan (it eliminates red) and magenta (it eliminates yellow). Similarly, other colors can be created:
To improve the quality of printing and reduce the costs another color was added into the CYM system – black, which could be otherwise created with an application of all three basic filters. This is how today’s most known printing standard CYMK was created. There are several theories what a K means, from being the last letter in black (B is already taken for blue – B in another system, called RGB) to the most believable K for Key, the color which is in most cases applied first for outlining.
But let’s get back to the color blue. Just like all other paints a blue paint is made from a pigment dissolved in a liquid vehicle (like water or oil). Typical paint made by classic procedures is a mixture of pigments (responsible for color), resins (keep pigments in place), solvent (to regulate the viscosity of paint) and additives (for fine tuning the properties of the paint).
Here how a blue pigment, called Fra Angelico, the starting point of so popular ultramarine blue color, is prepared:
This classic blue pigment is made from semi-precious stone Lapis Azuli and is the reason why blue color was for so many centuries reserved only for rich people. Today we have an enormous number of different pigments, some of natural, other of synthetic origin.
Do you need a list of blue pigments? Just read on!
Smalt (Saxon Blue)
Ultramarine (Lapis Lazuli)
Please note, some of these pigments contain toxic chemicals, especially heavy metals, so don’t play with them without prior knowledge and skills to handle them. This article is of informative nature only and if you want to know more about blue hues, you can simply check this list of different blue colors.
When we already have a pigment (or more pigments), the procedure goes as follows:
Please be aware of possible fumes, so take safety precautions. With this, we conclude our a bit longish answer to the seemingly simple, yet tricky question: »What makes blue?« See, colors are more of ideas than absolute facts, and each similar question can bring several right answers, all of the different logical concepts based on different perceptions.
This should not stop you from exploring the fascinated world of different colors. Have fun!
The cookie settings on this website are set to "allow cookies" to give you the best browsing experience possible. If you continue to use this website without changing your cookie settings or you click "Accept" below then you are consenting to this.