Bluenze · Colour sample book

Chapter 1 · Your colourBluenze · Palettes

Chapter 1

Colour palettes with a reason.

1933 — 2026

One starting colour and five plates, each with its reason: two from Sanzō Wada’s dictionary and three from a rule of harmony. With the roles in place and the contrast measured before you take it away.

Your starting colour

Blue · closest in the book:

The hue ruler · 158 notches, one per colour in the bookSpace → next in the book

Drag or use the arrows: the hue turns in LCH and the lightness and chroma stay where they were, if they fit on screen. With Shift, 12 at a time.
Chroma in LCH: how much colour it carries, with lightness and hue held still. The track goes up to the most that fits on screen at that lightness.
Lightness in LCH: the light moves and the hue stays put.
Plate I · Your wheelblue
  1. Twelve turns of your colour, every 30°, at the same lightness and the same saturation.
  2. The long wedges are the ones your plates use: your colour, its two neighbours and the opposite one.
  3. Tap a wedge and the whole book redraws from that colour.

Chapter 2 · How to read the plates

Chapter 2 · From the bookHaishoku Sōkan · 1933

From the book

The two Wada combinations that contain the book colours closest to yours, measured in Lab. They have been in use for almost a century: the harmony is already proven.

125

Fawn, Cerulian Blue, Blue Violet

#d7b7ad · #008ea5 · #674696

Light · button 4.9:1Warm and coolIts page →

175

Pinkish Cinnamon, Olive Buff, Blue Violet

#f0ba83 · #cdcd9b · #674696

Light · button 4.8:1Warm and coolIts page →
Chapter 2 · By ruleNamed harmonies

By rule

Three plates built from your colour with a rule that can be explained: the opposite, the neighbours or a single hue with an accent. None of them comes from a roll of the dice.

R·01

Complementary

#1f3bee · #b59f00 · #f0f3fc · #2d2705

Your colour and the one opposite it on the wheel, plus a light neutral and a dark version for background and text.

Light · button 4.8:1Warm and cool

R·02

Analogous

#0088cd · #1f3bee · #43009f · #f0f3fc

Your colour and its two neighbours on the wheel, plus a neutral that lets them breathe.

Light · button 4.9:1All cool

R·03

Monochrome with accent

#17295f · #1f3bee · #dde8ff · #b59f00

One hue in three lights and a small accent opposite it.

Light · button 3.1:1Warm and cool

Strip: the colours in equal parts, as in kimono sample books. It is the quickest reading for comparing.

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.

  1. Johannes Itten · Hype4 Academy (opens in a new tab)

    Distribute 60 · 30 · 10

  2. Refactoring UI (opens in a new tab)

    The background rests

  3. Material 3 · colour roles (opens in a new tab)

    The book's colour lives on the surface

  4. GOV.UK Design System (opens in a new tab)

    Paragraphs don't go in colour

  5. WCAG 2.2 · 1.4.3 and 1.4.11 (opens in a new tab)

    The accent earns the button

  6. Evil Martians · OKLCH in CSS (opens in a new tab)

    Move the lightness, not the hue

Plate III · The six, drawnWith Wada combination 125
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 · 4.9:1In 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 · 4.9:1Good 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 5°
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.
Plate IV · The 158Hue ∠ · saturation ⌀
The arrow keys step through them by hue; Enter takes the colour to chapter 1.
The book's 158 coloursEach colour sits at its hue, which is the angle, and as far from the centre as it has colour (chroma, measured in Lab). The double-ruled square is yours. Pick any other to take it to chapter 1.
Chapter 4Where they come from

We have read the book

In 1933 a Japanese painter and costume designer, Sanzō Wada, published a dictionary of colour combinations: 348 palettes meant for dyers, weavers and designers, drawn from years of working with real colour rather than a wheel. Almost a century later it still sits on the desk of many studios, ours included. We read it cover to cover, checked every value against the original and gave its 158 colours a name in Spanish.

That is why there is no “another random one” button here. A random generator hands you five pretty squares and no answers: which is the background, which is the text, what colour goes on the button, whether it reads. Every palette on this page comes from somewhere, Wada's dictionary or a named harmony rule, and arrives with its roles assigned and its contrast checked. If it does not read, we tell you before you take it.

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.

A note on this edition

The hex codes that circulate for this book — on almost every website, and on ours until September 2026 — come from a direct formula that treats ink as if it were light and forgets the paper. That is why they look louder than the book and sometimes shift hue: Eosine Pink came out as a neon fuchsia. We have redone all 158 with the standard press profile (FOGRA39, offset on coated paper), the way Photoshop would. Checked against photos of the printed book, they come closer in 32 of 36 colours, and Wada's labels (“pale”, “dark”…) go from failing in 29 combinations to failing in 4.

We have also redone the three harmony rules. They turned the hue at the same lightness and saturation, which gave blue with pure yellow or red with cyan: pairs that vibrate. Now the opposite colour moves away in lightness and drops a little saturation, the light neutral is tinted paper and the dark is a real ink.

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.

What people ask

How many colours should a palette have?
Three is the comfortable number: a background, a text colour and an accent. Two is a pair, not a brand. Four takes discipline, because the fourth either earns its place or gets in the way. Beyond five, two of them usually end up doing the same job.
What is the 60-30-10 rule?
That colours aren't shared out equally: one covers most of the surface, one accompanies, and the third only points. Wada said as much in 1933 in different words: the swatch is not the application, and a colour loses force the more surface it covers. What looks intense on a strip of samples calms down at full screen.
How do I know my palette is readable?
By measuring the contrast between text and background. The legal minimum in Spain is 4.5:1 for normal text and 3:1 for large text. Every palette here comes measured, and also in APCA, the newer criterion and the only one that accounts for size and weight: the same pair doesn't read the same at 12 px as at 32.
Who was Sanzō Wada?
A Japanese painter and costume designer who published a dictionary of colour combinations in 1933: 348 palettes drawn from years of working with real colour rather than from a wheel. Nearly a century on it's still on many studio desks. The values here are checked against the book.
Why don't your hex codes match other websites?
Because almost all of them move the book's CMYK to screen with a direct formula that oversaturates. We convert it with the standard press profile (FOGRA39), which accounts for ink and paper, and the result is closer to the printed book. On each combination's page we also give you the hex you will find elsewhere, so you can recognise it.
Can I use these palettes for my brand?
Yes, and they're free. Wada's colours are data, not a registrable work, and the names, explanations and advice are ours and yours to use. What no tool can hand you is the reasoning for why your business needs that colour and not another: that part happens at a table.
What about the dark version?
It comes with every palette, inside the kit. It isn't inverting the colours: the background takes on your brand's hue instead of being pure black, and the accent is lifted until it still reads. An accent that works on white almost never works the same on black.

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.

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