Pressed Tied Moss

Latin pressāre, to press — past-participle of press. As a color modifier, pressed implies a clear-and-smoothed-and-flattened quality, the crisp color of Mid-Century-Modern freshly-pressed-shirt-and-trouser ironed-textile finish. Sits at the crisp-and-finished end of the grid, parallel to ironed and starched in usage.

Old English tīgan, to-tie or to-bind. As a color modifier, tied implies a hand-tied-and-knotted quality, the visual register of hand-tied-and-knotted-rope-and-string hand-tied-and-knotted-fishing-net-and-shoelace-and-bow hand-tied-and-knotted-rope-and-cord surfaces under hand-tied-and-knotted-rope-and-cord working-light. Sits at the modifier-and-texture end of the grid, parallel to sewn and knot in usage.

Bryophyta — the nonvascular plants that colonized land 470 million years ago, before vascular plants and far before flowers. The color refers to a thick mat of Hypnum or sphagnum on a temperate forest floor: a soft, slightly yellow-shifted green with the velvet texture of millimeter-scale leaves. Dustier than fern, deeper than lichen, with the slow patience of a plant that lives by absorbing rain through its surface.