From Wada's dictionary, 1933
Wada combination 291
Its colours, with the book's names: Light Green Yellow · Sea Green · Cobalt Green · Calamine Blue. 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 1.1:1: does not read.
On screen, the text #1c261d on the background #e5faf0 gives 14.3:1: AAA, reads with room to spare. APCA gives Lc 97: good for small text, the kind you read a paragraph of.
The accent #2e9f3c stands 3.1:1 from the background (a button needs 3:1) and as a link reaches 4.8:1 (a word needs 4.5:1).
Under Protanopia, your accent and your background drop to 3.0:1. The button stops standing out: give it a border, change the lightness, or don't rely on colour alone to mark it.
How to use it
- Proportion
Distribute, don't equalise: #e5faf0 on 60% of the screen, #80ffcc on 30% (cards, bands, headers) and #2e9f3c 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 1.1:1). That is why body text goes in #1c261d, a near-neutral ink tinted with the palette's hue: it is not in the book, and it is needed.
- The button
The accent #2e9f3c stands 3.1:1 apart from the background: it works as a button, with text in #1c261d.
- Temperature
Warm and cool together: let one lead and the other point. Here the background #80ffcc leads, and the accent #2e9f3c is the first thing the eye will look for.
- How many
Four colours demand discipline: #80ffcc and #14803b are the base, the other two are detail. If in doubt, drop the support colour before the accent.
- 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 light ones: works on white and on screen; in print it loses body, so push the ink a notch.
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 whole palette sits on the active side of the circle: the colours that advance, warm and push outward.
- Surface · green
Green is where the eye rests. Goethe says whoever looks at it neither wishes nor is able to imagine anything beyond it, which is why it was the colour for rooms you live in. In an interface that is precisely a background.
- Accent and Heading · green
Green is the colour of rest, so as an accent it points at nothing: the eye accepts it and moves on. If this palette needs something to stop the eye, this is not it.
- Adjacent
Adjacent on the circle, with nothing between them. Ordinary and agreeable: it says little, and it does not offend.
- Adjacent
Adjacent on the circle, with nothing between them. Ordinary and agreeable: it says little, and it does not offend.
- Adjacent
Adjacent on the circle, with nothing between them. Ordinary and agreeable: it says little, and it does not offend.
- 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.
- 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.
- 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.
#bdf226 and #33ff7d are neighbours on the circle and only 0 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.
#bdf226 and #94ff94 are neighbours on the circle and only 3 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.
#bdf226 and #80ffcc are neighbours on the circle and only 3 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 are 3 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.
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#ebfbe9
- 100#d7f2d4
- 200#b6e3b2
- 300#8cce8a
- 400#5eb65f
- 500#2e9f3c
- 600#0d8127
- 700#02661b
- 800#024b12
- 900#013207
- 50#f6f7f5
- 100#e9ebe9
- 200#d5d8d4
- 300#bbbfba
- 400#9fa59e
- 500#848b83
- 600#6b716a
- 700#535953
- 800#3d413c
- 900#282b27
- Normal
- Hover
- Pressed
- Disabled
- Focus
- Success
- Warning
- Error
- Info
The same colour, at night.
The background isn't pure black: it carries a little of your hue. That's what separates a designed dark mode from one that looks like a fault.
A button/* Wada combination 291 — bluenze.com/paletas */
:root {
--fondo: #e5faf0;
--superficie: #80ffcc;
--texto: #1c261d;
--tinta: #1c261d;
--texto-suave: #58675a;
--titular: #14803b;
--acento: #2e9f3c;
--acento-texto: #1c261d;
--enlace: #0c7e26;
--borde: #bdd8cb;
--apoyo-1: #bdf226;
/* la lámina de Wada, tal cual */
--lamina-1: #bdf226;
--lamina-2: #33ff7d;
--lamina-3: #94ff94;
--lamina-4: #80ffcc;
--acento-50: #ebfbe9;
--acento-100: #d7f2d4;
--acento-200: #b6e3b2;
--acento-300: #8cce8a;
--acento-400: #5eb65f;
--acento-500: #2e9f3c;
--acento-600: #0d8127;
--acento-700: #02661b;
--acento-800: #024b12;
--acento-900: #013207;
--neutro-50: #f6f7f5;
--neutro-100: #e9ebe9;
--neutro-200: #d5d8d4;
--neutro-300: #bbbfba;
--neutro-400: #9fa59e;
--neutro-500: #848b83;
--neutro-600: #6b716a;
--neutro-700: #535953;
--neutro-800: #3d413c;
--neutro-900: #282b27;
--boton: #2e9f3c;
--boton-encima: #0d8c2a;
--boton-pulsado: #077822;
--boton-apagado: #c6d5c4;
--foco: #0aa130;
--exito: #087f20;
--aviso: #a28a09;
--error: #c43e2b;
--info: #1070b9;
}
@media (prefers-color-scheme: dark) {
:root {
--fondo: #1a241a;
--superficie: #253124;
--borde: #3c4a3b;
--texto: #e9f0e8;
--tinta: #e9f0e8;
--texto-suave: #abb3a9;
--acento: #3cab47;
--acento-texto: #1d261c;
}
}