colors
Back to gallery

Hospitable Vala Teal

#237c7e
Notes

Hospitable Vala Teal (#237C7E) is a deep cyan with a cool character. It leans cool, sitting on the blue, green, and violet side of the wheel. Quiet and dependable, a fit for product UI and data visualization. Its HSL profile (181°, 57%, 32%) places it in the balanced band at a dark lightness. It works well as a headline, icon, or deep background in an otherwise light layout, pairing cleanly with cream, bone, and warm neutrals. 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
#237c7e
RGB
rgb(35, 124, 126)
HSL
hsl(181, 57%, 32%)
HWB
hwb(181 14% 51%)
OKLCH
oklch(53.7% 0.081 197.2)
P3
color(display-p3 0.2468 0.4794 0.4899)
HSV
hsv(181, 72%, 49%)
LAB
lab(47.34% -24.53 -8.62)
LCH
lch(47.34% 26.00 199.37)
CMYK
cmyk(72%, 2%, 0%, 51%)

Etymology

Hospitable
adjective

Latin hospitābilis, of-the-host — adjectival suffix -able. As a color modifier, hospitable implies a clear-and-cordial-and-welcoming quality where the hue carries the visual register of Bed-and-Breakfast and country-inn warm-cordial-host atmosphere. Sits at the crisp-and-cheerful end of the grid, parallel to welcoming and inviting in usage.

Vala
modifier

Old Norse völva, Norse-seeress-and-staff-bearer. As a color modifier, vala implies a Norse-seeress-and-staff-bearer-and-prophetess quality, the visual register of Norse-vala-seeress-and-staff hand-Norse-seeress-and-staff-bearer-and-prophetess Norse-vala-seeress-and-staff-and-Voluspa-Edda vala-and-Norse-seeress-and-staff-bearer surfaces under Norse-vala-seeress-and-staff-and-Voluspa-Edda Saga-Iceland-and-rune-stave seeress-prophecy-light. Sits at the modifier-and-myth end of the grid, parallel to norn and freya in usage.

Teal
noun

Anas crecca, the small dabbling duck whose male in breeding plumage sports a chestnut head crossed by a glossy green-blue stripe. The color refers to that stripe — the iridescent panel just behind the eye: a saturated, slightly muted blue-green with the optical depth of structural color rather than pigment. Cooler than cypress, warmer than cerulean, with the ornithological specificity of a color named for one feather of one bird.

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.

#237c7e
Original
#73767e
Protanopia
#666c7f
Deuteranopia
#00807c
Tritanopia
#696969
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).
AAon White
4.93:1
The quick brown foxSample body text at normal size. The wcag minimum for body contrast is 4.5:1 (AA) or 7:1 (AAA).
AA Largeon Black
4.26:1

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
##237C7E
Display P3
Display P3
color(display-p3 0.2468 0.4794 0.4899)
P3 has subtle headroomOKLCH chroma 0.081

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.

Related Colors

Canvas