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Stripped Celtic Lagoon

#18c4e0
Notes

Stripped Celtic Lagoon (#18C4E0) is a true cyan with a vibrant character. It holds its own as a focal accent, carrying visual weight without tipping into neon territory. Its HSL profile (188°, 81%, 49%) places it in the highly saturated band at a mid lightness. Best used in small doses, like logos, CTAs, focus rings, or highlight text, where its saturation becomes a feature rather than noise. For a confident two-color system, pair it with its complementary red. For something softer, pull in its analogous neighbors on either side of the wheel.

HEX
#18c4e0
RGB
rgb(24, 196, 224)
HSL
hsl(188, 81%, 49%)
HWB
hwb(188 9% 12%)
OKLCH
oklch(75.5% 0.129 213.1)
P3
color(display-p3 0.3583 0.7573 0.8644)
HSV
hsv(188, 89%, 88%)
LAB
lab(72.93% -29.88 -25.20)
LCH
lch(72.93% 39.09 220.14)
CMYK
cmyk(89%, 12%, 0%, 12%)

Etymology

Stripped
adjective

Old English stripian, to strip — past-participle of strip. As a color modifier, stripped implies a clear-and-bared-and-unornamented quality, the crisp color of Cistercian-and-Bauhaus anti-ornamental stripped-down architectural interior. Sits at the crisp-and-stripped end of the grid, parallel to spare and bare in usage.

Celtic
modifier

Latin Celticus, of-the-Celts. As a color modifier, celtic implies a knotwork-and-La-Tène quality, the visual register of Irish-and-Welsh-and-Scottish Celtic-knotwork hand-carved bronze-and-stone metalwork-and-illuminated-manuscript surfaces under Celtic-Irish-Welsh-Scottish illuminated-manuscript-tradition light. Sits at the modifier-and-cultural end of the grid, parallel to norse and welsh in usage.

Lagoon
noun

A shallow body of saltwater partially or fully enclosed by a barrier — coral atoll lagoons in the Pacific, Venice's Laguna Veneta, the Florida Keys' backcountry. The color refers to the average reflectance of a calm tropical lagoon at midday: a saturated, slightly muted blue-green with the optical clarity of shallow water over white sand. Brighter than reef, cooler than aquamarine, with the postcard weight of a Pacific atoll seen from above.

Closest matches

The nearest named color in three reference sources, ranked by perceptual distance (ΔE76 in CIELAB). ΔE < 1 is imperceptible to most viewers; ΔE > 10 is clearly different. When two sources point to the same hex they’re merged into one tile; click any to open that color’s page.

Variations

Click any swatch to explore

Harmonies

Accessibility

Color-vision simulation

How this color appears to viewers with the four major color-vision-deficiency types. Computed via the Machado (2009) physiologically-based model. If a tile matches the original, the color reads the same to that viewer.

#18c4e0
Original
#afbde2
Protanopia
#97abe0
Deuteranopia
#00cfcd
Tritanopia
#a1a1a1
Achromatopsia
WCAG contrast

The color used as foreground text against pure white and pure black, with the contrast ratio and WCAG 2.1 grade. Aim for AA (4.5:1) for body text and AA Large (3:1) for 18 pt+ headlines; AAA (7:1) is the gold standard for long-form reading surfaces.

The quick brown foxSample body text at normal size. The wcag minimum for body contrast is 4.5:1 (AA) or 7:1 (AAA).
Failon White
2.10:1
The quick brown foxSample body text at normal size. The wcag minimum for body contrast is 4.5:1 (AA) or 7:1 (AAA).
AAAon Black
10.01:1

Wide gamut

Display P3 representation

The CSS Color 4 wide-gamut form of this color. Both swatches render the same color on every display — the P3 form only diverges from sRGB when a designer pushes channels outside sRGB's reach.

sRGB hex
sRGB hex
##18C4E0
Display P3
Display P3
color(display-p3 0.3583 0.7573 0.8644)
P3 has subtle headroomOKLCH chroma 0.129

Moderately saturated colors gain a small bump in P3 — the difference is usually visible side-by-side on wide-gamut hardware but won't change the character of the color.

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