Etched Quilt Teal

German ätzen, to etch — past-participle of etch. As a color modifier, etched implies a clear-and-precisely-incised quality, the crisp color of Rembrandt-and-Dürer hand-pulled etching-print fine-line incised-image. Sits at the crisp-and-incised end of the grid, parallel to engraved and inscribed in usage.

Old French cuilte, padded-cushion. As a color modifier, quilt implies a hand-quilted-padded-textile quality, the visual register of American-and-English-quilt hand-quilted-and-padded patchwork-and-coverlet hand-quilted-and-padded textile surfaces under American-and-English hand-quilted-and-padded textile workshop-light. Sits at the modifier-and-texture end of the grid, parallel to tufted and flock in usage.

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.