From Wada's dictionary, 1933
Wada combination 181
Its colours, with the book's names: Carmine Red · Violet · Cotinga Purple. The values are the book's; the roles and advice are ours.
Adapted for screen
The same hue as the plate with the lightness moved to where an interface needs it: the background rests, the surface keeps the colour from the book and the accent earns the button. Each role says which colour it comes from and what was done to it. Click any to copy.
On a website
This is your colour with a whole screen to fill.
This paragraph is here so you can see real text on a real background, which is where half of the pretty palettes fall over. If it's hard to read, now you know. And this is a link.
A card
Secondary surfaces use the support colour. If it doesn't separate from the background, the hierarchy is gone.
Measured, before and after
On the plate, the best pair of colours reads at 2.0:1: does not read.
On screen, the text #f9ebea on the background #271e2c gives 13.8:1: AAA, reads with room to spare. APCA gives Lc 94: good for small text, the kind you read a paragraph of.
The accent #714bff stands 3.2:1 from the background (a button needs 3:1) and as a link reaches 4.5:1 (a word needs 4.5:1).
How to use it
- Proportion
Distribute, don't equalise: #271e2c on 60% of the screen, #431068 on 30% (cards, bands, headers) and #714bff on 10%, only on buttons and links. A colour loses force the more surface it covers; what looks intense on the plate softens at full screen.
- Text
No pair on the plate read as text (the best gave 2.0:1). That is why body text goes in #f9ebea, a near-neutral ink tinted with the palette's hue: it is not in the book, and it is needed.
- The button
The accent #714bff stands 3.2:1 apart from the background: it works as a button, with text in #faf5fc.
- Temperature
Warm and cool together: let one lead and the other point. Here the background #431068 leads, and the accent #714bff is the first thing the eye will look for.
- How many
Three colours is the comfortable measure: background, text and one accent. Don't add a fourth unless it earns its place by contrast or by hue.
- In the dictionary
In the dictionary it sits among the tone-on-tone sets: colours from one family. Hierarchy comes from light, not hue, so order elements from lightest to darkest. It is one of the dark ones: it needs light text and large surfaces; in small pieces it clogs.
Goethe's reading
What this combination conveys, and why.
Wada tells you which colours go together. Goethe, a century earlier, explains why a combination means something or means nothing, and what each colour does depending on how much of the screen it takes. His circle has six colours and three oppositions, and every verdict below carries the paragraph it comes from.
The palette crosses both sides of the circle, active and passive. It carries the most tension and most needs one of the two to lead.
- Surface · violet
Goethe puts it bluntly: a large surface of pure violet would be intolerable. It holds up here because the screen adaptation has taken the chroma down. On the plate, at full saturation, it would not.
- Accent · violet
The violet that would be intolerable as a background works in a border or a button. Same colour, different dose: this is a rule about surface, not about hue.
- Heading · red
Red is the high point of the active side. In a small patch it does exactly what an accent is for: stopping the eye once.
- Adjacent
Adjacent on the circle, with no colour between them to keep them apart. They are saved by proportion: one has to lead and the other to follow.
- Adjacent
Adjacent on the circle, with no colour between them to keep them apart. They are saved by proportion: one has to lead and the other to follow.
- Same sector
Both fall in the same sector of the circle. There is no hue contrast, so whatever separates them will have to be lightness.
#a10b2b and #2619d1 are neighbours on the circle and only 5 points of lightness apart. This is the failure Goethe describes without naming it: well-chosen colours placed at the wrong value. They vibrate, and neither can be read on top of the other.
3 colours at full strength and almost the same lightness. Motley is not having many colours: it is having them all talk at once with nothing deciding the order.
There is nowhere for the eye to rest: no neutral, no muted colour, no green. The whole palette asks for attention at once.
The kit for building it
A brand needs four colours; an interface needs a good deal more. This is what you'd otherwise invent by hand once you take four hex codes into the editor.
- 50#f6f6f6
- 100#ebebeb
- 200#e1d0fd
- 300#ccb2fc
- 400#b390fc
- 500#966eff
- 600#714bff
- 700#5739d1
- 800#3f27a1
- 900#271774
- 50#f7f6f8
- 100#ebeaed
- 200#d8d6db
- 300#bfbdc3
- 400#a5a2a9
- 500#8b8790
- 600#716e76
- 700#59565d
- 800#413f44
- 900#2b292d
- Normal
- Hover
- Pressed
- Disabled
- Focus
- Success
- Warning
- Error
- Info
The same colour, by day.
The palette is born dark; this is its light version. The background is not pure white: it carries a little of its hue, just as the dark one was not black.
A button/* Wada combination 181 — bluenze.com/paletas */
:root {
--fondo: #271e2c;
--superficie: #431068;
--texto: #f9ebea;
--tinta: #f9ebea;
--texto-suave: #c1acab;
--titular: #eb5a62;
--acento: #714bff;
--acento-texto: #faf5fc;
--enlace: #956efd;
--borde: #4e4354;
/* la lámina de Wada, tal cual */
--lamina-1: #a10b2b;
--lamina-2: #2619d1;
--lamina-3: #340059;
--acento-50: #f6f6f6;
--acento-100: #ebebeb;
--acento-200: #e1d0fd;
--acento-300: #ccb2fc;
--acento-400: #b390fc;
--acento-500: #966eff;
--acento-600: #714bff;
--acento-700: #5739d1;
--acento-800: #3f27a1;
--acento-900: #271774;
--neutro-50: #f7f6f8;
--neutro-100: #ebeaed;
--neutro-200: #d8d6db;
--neutro-300: #bfbdc3;
--neutro-400: #a5a2a9;
--neutro-500: #8b8790;
--neutro-600: #716e76;
--neutro-700: #59565d;
--neutro-800: #413f44;
--neutro-900: #2b292d;
--boton: #714bff;
--boton-encima: #8c64fc;
--boton-pulsado: #a17cfa;
--boton-apagado: #3f364f;
--foco: #724cfa;
--exito: #4ec251;
--aviso: #d3b41c;
--error: #fd8b74;
--info: #6baefe;
}
@media (prefers-color-scheme: light) {
:root {
--fondo: #f8f3ff;
--superficie: #ece5f8;
--borde: #d6cee4;
--texto: #26222d;
--tinta: #26222d;
--texto-suave: #66616f;
--acento: #714bff;
--acento-texto: #f8f5fd;
}
}