Ostentatious Coiled Turquoise

Latin ostentātiōnis, display — adjectival suffix -ous, derived from ostendere (to show). As a color modifier, ostentatious implies a saturated-and-attention-demanding-and-elaborate quality, the bright color of Belle-Époque-and-Gilded-Age showy-luxury-display interior-decoration. Sits at the bright-and-flamboyant end of the grid, parallel to flamboyant and showy in usage.

Old French coillir, to-collect. As a color modifier, coiled implies a wound-and-spiral quality, the visual register of hand-coiled-rope-and-clay hand-coiled-and-wound rope-and-clay-and-pottery hand-coiled-and-wound coil-and-spiral-and-pottery surfaces under hand-coiled-and-wound pottery-and-rope workshop-light. Sits at the modifier-and-texture end of the grid, parallel to twined and looped in usage.

The hydrated copper-aluminum phosphate mined in Persia and the American Southwest for thousands of years — the firuze of Iran, the chalchihuitl of Mesoamerica, the heart of Pueblo and Navajo silverwork. The color refers to a fine Sleeping Beauty turquoise from Arizona: a saturated, slightly green-shifted blue with the slight matrix of host-rock veining. Brighter than persian, lighter than cerulean.