Plain Arbor Moss

Latin planus, flat, level — used as a color modifier since the medieval period for hues that read as undecorated and direct. Plain white, plain blue: moderate saturation, no shift, no surface effect. Sits in the crisp-bucket center, with the implication of restraint rather than absence.

Latin arbor, tree-or-trunk. As a color modifier, arbor implies a Latin-tree-and-vine-arbor quality, the visual register of Pliny-Natural-History-and-Roman-villa-arbor hand-Latin-tree-and-vine-arbor Pliny-Natural-History-and-Roman-villa-arbor-and-pergola arbor-and-Latin-tree-and-vine-arbor surfaces under Pliny-Natural-History-and-Roman-villa-arbor-and-pergola Pompeii-and-Tuscan-pergola-and-grape-arbor leafy-shade-light. Sits at the modifier-and-Latin end of the grid, parallel to via and domus 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.