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Cleansed Kilt Teal

#2b807d
Notes

Cleansed Kilt Teal (#2B807D) is a deep cyan with an earthy character. It leans grounded and natural, the kind of color that plays well with wood, clay, linen, and warm neutrals. Its HSL profile (178°, 50%, 34%) 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
#2b807d
RGB
rgb(43, 128, 125)
HSL
hsl(178, 50%, 34%)
HWB
hwb(178 17% 50%)
OKLCH
oklch(54.9% 0.080 191.7)
P3
color(display-p3 0.2676 0.4951 0.4876)
HSV
hsv(178, 66%, 50%)
LAB
lab(48.80% -25.61 -5.83)
LCH
lch(48.80% 26.27 192.82)
CMYK
cmyk(66%, 0%, 2%, 50%)

Etymology

Cleansed
adjective

Old English clǣnsian, to make clean — past-participle of cleanse. As a color modifier, cleansed implies a clear-and-purified quality where the hue has been stripped of any contaminating tint. Sits at the crisp-and-clear end of the grid, parallel to fresh and pristine in usage.

Kilt
modifier

Scots kilt, Highland-pleated-skirt. As a color modifier, kilt implies a Highland-tartan-and-pleated-skirt quality, the visual register of Highland-tartan-and-Black-Watch-kilt hand-Highland-tartan-and-pleated-skirt Highland-tartan-and-Black-Watch-kilt-and-clan-Macleod kilt-and-Highland-tartan surfaces under Highland-tartan-and-Black-Watch-kilt-and-clan-Macleod Highland-clan-and-Edinburgh-tartan-mill tartan-and-pleated-light. Sits at the modifier-and-textile end of the grid, parallel to sash and tabard 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.

#2b807d
Original
#78797d
Protanopia
#6b707e
Deuteranopia
#00847f
Tritanopia
#6e6e6e
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
4.68:1
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
4.49:1

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
##2B807D
Display P3
Display P3
color(display-p3 0.2676 0.4951 0.4876)
Inside sRGBOKLCH chroma 0.080

This color sits well within the sRGB cube. P3 and sRGB share the gray axis and most desaturated tones, so a P3 display renders this identically to an sRGB display.

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