Bluenze · Colour sample book

Dictionary · 274 of 348Palettes

Combination 274 from Wada's dictionary · contrasting hues, pale

Colour palette: Peach Red, Dark Citrine, Olympic Blue and Light Mauve.

One of the 348 combinations Sanzō Wada set down in 1933, with roles assigned, contrast checked and advice for using it.

Haishoku Sōkan · 1933

The plate, as printedWada · 274

4 colours in equal parts, as in the book. It is the inspiration, not the interface. Click one to copy it.

Combination 274 · the plate, in four leaves

I · The colours, one by oneWada · 274

What each one is.

The hex codes come from the book's CMYK run through the FOGRA39 press profile. Under each colour we also list the hex other websites use, which comes from a direct formula and oversaturates.

Peach Red
Rojo anaranjado vivo
CMYK 0 · 80 · 90 · 0
Elsewhere: #ff3319
Wada uses it in 8 combinations.
Five palettes from this colour →
Dark Citrine
Verde caqui oscuro
CMYK 38 · 34 · 67 · 20
Elsewhere: #7e8743
Wada uses it in 4 combinations.
Five palettes from this colour →
Olympic Blue
Azul cielo
CMYK 69 · 44 · 10 · 0
Elsewhere: #4f8fe6
Wada uses it in 7 combinations.
Five palettes from this colour →
Light Mauve
Malva violáceo
CMYK 43 · 62 · 5 · 0
Elsewhere: #9161f2
Wada uses it in 7 combinations.
Five palettes from this colour →

Plate · MixesThree parts to one

The four colours, mixed two by two

3 parts peach red1 part dark citrine
3 parts dark citrine1 part olympic blue
3 parts olympic blue1 part light mauve
3 parts light mauve1 part peach red
3 parts peach red1 part olympic blue
3 parts dark citrine1 part light mauve
3 parts olympic blue1 part peach red
3 parts light mauve1 part dark citrine
3 parts peach red1 part light mauve
3 parts dark citrine1 part peach red
3 parts olympic blue1 part dark citrine
3 parts light mauve1 part olympic blue

This is where the in-betweens the plate doesn’t carry come from: borders, card backgrounds, disabled states. The mix is done in OKLab, which is closer to mixing paint than to averaging numbers. Click the result to copy it.

On screen · the split60 · 30 · 10

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.

60% BackgroundWhere the eye rests: most of the screen. The plate's #968a59, lightened.
30% SurfaceCards, bands, headers. This is where the book's colour lives. From the plate, as is (#968a59).
10% AccentOnly what gets clicked. The plate's #e94e24, darkened.

The roles the plate doesn’t carry

Measured, before and after

On the plate, the best pair of colours reads at 1.1:1: does not read.Falls short
On screen, the text #20242b on the background #fbf5e4 gives 14.2:1: AAA, reads with room to spare. APCA gives Lc 97: good for small text, the kind you read a paragraph of.Passes
The accent #cb330b stands 4.7:1 from the background (a button needs 3:1) and as a link reaches 4.6:1 (a word needs 4.5:1).Passes

Out in the worldAdapted

This is the plate 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.

Adapted: the background rests, the surface keeps the plate’s colour and the accent earns the button.

How to use it

ProportionDistribute, don't equalise: #fbf5e4 on 60% of the screen, #968a59 on 30% (cards, bands, headers) and #cb330b 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.
TextNo pair on the plate read as text (the best gave 1.1:1). That is why body text goes in #20242b, a near-neutral ink tinted with the palette's hue: it is not in the book, and it is needed.
The buttonThe accent #cb330b stands 4.7:1 apart from the background: it works as a button, with text in #f9f6ef.
TemperatureWarm and cool together: let one lead and the other point. Here the background #968a59 leads, and the accent #cb330b is the first thing the eye will look for.
How manyFour colours demand discipline: #968a59 and #466ea0 are the base, the other two are detail. If in doubt, drop the support colour before the accent.
In the dictionaryIn the dictionary it sits among the contrasting-hue sets: hues deliberately set against each other. The contrast is already there; don't force it with shadows or blacks. It is one of the pale ones: muted tones that get along; running text needs an ink from outside, near black.

The kit · ramps and statesFor the design system

The kit

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.

Click any swatch to copy it.

The accent’s tints

The neutrals, tinted with the accent

Button states and alerts

The kit · night and code274

The same plate, at night

The same colour, at night.

The background isn’t pure black: it carries a little of the accent’s hue. That’s what separates a designed dark mode from one that looks like a fault.

A button

Take it with you

/* Wada combination 274 — bluenze.com/paletas */
:root {
  --fondo: #fbf5e4;
  --superficie: #968a59;
  --texto: #20242b;
  --tinta: #20242b;
  --texto-suave: #5e636d;
  --titular: #466ea0;
  --acento: #cb330b;
  --acento-texto: #f9f6ef;
  --enlace: #cf360f;
  --borde: #d9d1bb;
  --apoyo-1: #a272aa;

  /* la lámina de Wada, tal cual */
  --lamina-1: #e94e24;
  --lamina-2: #968a59;
  --lamina-3: #5c82b6;
  --lamina-4: #a272aa;

  --acento-50: #f6f6f6;
  --acento-100: #ebebeb;
  --acento-200: #ffccbb;
  --acento-300: #fdaa8f;
  --acento-400: #fe7e57;
  --acento-500: #ef5429;
  --acento-600: #cb330b;
  --acento-700: #a72504;
  --acento-800: #7d1a00;
  --acento-900: #511602;
  --neutro-50: #f8f6f5;
  --neutro-100: #eeeae9;
  --neutro-200: #dcd6d4;
  --neutro-300: #c5bcba;
  --neutro-400: #aba19e;
  --neutro-500: #928683;
  --neutro-600: #786d6a;
  --neutro-700: #5e5552;
  --neutro-800: #463e3c;
  --neutro-900: #2e2927;

  --boton: #cb330b;
  --boton-encima: #af2603;
  --boton-pulsado: #911e02;
  --boton-apagado: #c7aaa0;
  --foco: #cd3006;

  --exito: #0b7f21;
  --aviso: #a28a0d;
  --error: #c93625;
  --info: #0470ba;
}

@media (prefers-color-scheme: dark) {
  :root {
    --fondo: #2d1e19;
    --superficie: #3d2a24;
    --borde: #58423a;
    --texto: #f8ebe7;
    --tinta: #f8ebe7;
    --texto-suave: #bcaea9;
    --acento: #fc653a;
    --acento-texto: #2e211c;
  }
}

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Goethe’s readingWhat it conveys

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.

What it conveys, by where each colour landed

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 · yellow
Yellow across a large surface is a gamble. It is the least forgiving colour: the slightest drift towards green turns gold into dirt, and on screen that drift is supplied by compression or a gradient. § 770
Accent · orange
Orange in a small patch is the accent that needs no explaining: it advances, it is seen, and it does not need size to do it. § 775
Heading · blue
Blue recedes, and an accent is asked to do the opposite. As a link it only has to be distinguishable; as a primary button it needs contrast to do the work the colour will not. § 781

What is happening to this palette

#e94e24 and #968a59 are neighbours on the circle and only 2 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. § 899
#5c82b6 and #a272aa are neighbours on the circle and only 1 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. § 899
There are 4 points of lightness between the lightest and darkest colour. With no step in lightness there is no hierarchy: the palette leans entirely on hue, and hue alone does not order a screen. § 849

How each pair readsZur Farbenlehre · 1810

How each pair reads on the circle

Adjacent #e94e24 · #968a59
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. § 828
Opposite #e94e24 · #5c82b6
Opposite on the circle: together they complete what the eye asks for on its own. It is the only category Goethe approves without reservation. § 810
Characteristic #e94e24 · #a272aa
Orange and violet, with red skipped. It excites because it hints at pure red without ever showing it. § 822
Characteristic #968a59 · #5c82b6
Yellow and blue, with green skipped. Goethe finds it poor: red is missing, and the nearness of green leaves it slight. § 819
Opposite #968a59 · #a272aa
Opposite on the circle: together they complete what the eye asks for on its own. It is the only category Goethe approves without reservation. § 810
Adjacent #5c82b6 · #a272aa
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. § 828

Criteria taken from Zur Farbenlehre (1810), in Eastlake's 1840 translation, which is public domain. The explanations are ours: from a book you take the substance, not the wording. The light values usually credited to Goethe for working out surface proportions are not in the Farbenlehre — they are Itten's, 1961, and that is how they are credited in the adaptation rules.

The card1200 × 630

The card, as it gets shared

Colour palette Peach Red, Dark Citrine, Olympic Blue and Light Mauve, with its hex codes — This palette’s card: it’s what shows when you share it.

Shared colours8 from the book

They share a colour

Other dictionary combinations with these colours.

This combination also lives under a colour.

All the dictionary combinations →Go to the tool →

Chapter 3From plate to screen

Chapter 3

From plate to screen: six rules that are not ours

Wada worked with ink. You work with light.

Wada designed for ink, cloth and pigment. A screen emits light, is read for minutes at a time and has a law. These are the rules colour for interfaces is built with, and the ones we adapt each plate with; none of them is ours, so each one carries its owner.

Johannes Itten · Hype4 Academy (opens in a new tab)
Distribute 60 · 30 · 10
Refactoring UI (opens in a new tab)
The background rests
Material 3 · colour roles (opens in a new tab)
The book's colour lives on the surface
GOV.UK Design System (opens in a new tab)
Paragraphs don't go in colour
WCAG 2.2 · 1.4.3 and 1.4.11 (opens in a new tab)
The accent earns the button
Evil Martians · OKLCH in CSS (opens in a new tab)
Move the lightness, not the hue

Plate III · The six, drawnWith Wada combination 274

In the book · equal partsOn screen · 60 · 30 · 10

One colour dominates, another accompanies and the third only points. In the book they sit in equal parts because that is how you compare them; on screen, equalising them is noise. Itten measured it in 1961: complementaries balance in areas inverse to their strength.

background heretext here

The background lives at one end of the lightness scale, very light or very dark, with little colour. Neither pure white nor pure black: tinted with the palette's hue, which is what separates a designed interface from an assembled one.

Surface · 30%

Cards, bands and headers are the 30%: that is where Wada's colour shows at full size without carrying a paragraph. Material separates a colour from its role, “surface” and “on-surface”, so the hue can change without touching the interface.

A whole paragraph in the book's colour tires you out by the third line.Accent on background · 4.7:1In the tinted ink it reads without a second thought.Text on background · 14.2:1

Long text goes in a near-black (or near-white) tinted with the palette's hue, at 7:1. The book's colours enter through headings, where size forgives. GOV.UK writes in #0b0c0c, not #000.

Book a slotAccent / background · 4.7:1Good for a button

The most saturated colour goes only on what gets clicked, and is held to what the law asks of a component: 3:1 against the background (WCAG 1.4.11). As a word, 4.5:1 (1.4.3): a button and a link are not the same thing, and Radix gives them two different steps of its scale.

Lab · the hue stays putHSL · the hue drifts 3°

Every adjustment is a change of lightness in a perceptual space (Lab, OKLCH): the hue stays put. In HSL, darkening a blue turns it violet and lightening it turns it lilac.

Colophon

Colour is where it starts, not the whole job

If it is for your brand, this is what we do: custom websites that start with colour and end in code.

And something Wada already warned about back then: the plate is not the application. His samples sit on equal surfaces only so they can be compared. On a website the background leads, the text reads and the accent points, and a colour loses strength the more surface it covers. That is why every palette comes with its roles and some advice, not four equal squares.

Combinations based on Sanzō Wada's system (Haishoku Sōkan, 1933-34; Seigensha selection, 2010). Colour values are checked against that edition; the Spanish names, each combination's character and the explanations are ours.

Custom web design →And your current site? See if they can find you →

What each one is.

Peach Red

Dark Citrine

Olympic Blue

Light Mauve