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Orderly Celtic Verdigris

#3bbabb
Notes

Orderly Celtic Verdigris (#3BBABB) is a true 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 (180°, 52%, 48%) places it in the balanced band at a mid lightness. It works across type, buttons, and borders, saturated enough to feel deliberate but balanced enough to not fight the rest of the palette. 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
#3bbabb
RGB
rgb(59, 186, 187)
HSL
hsl(180, 52%, 48%)
HWB
hwb(180 23% 27%)
OKLCH
oklch(72.2% 0.108 195.8)
P3
color(display-p3 0.3858 0.7194 0.7279)
HSV
hsv(180, 68%, 73%)
LAB
lab(69.21% -33.28 -10.58)
LCH
lch(69.21% 34.92 197.63)
CMYK
cmyk(68%, 1%, 0%, 27%)

Etymology

Orderly
adjective

Latin ōrdō, order — adjectival suffix -ly. As a color modifier, orderly implies a clear-and-arranged-and-organized quality where the hue carries the visual register of carefully-ordered-and-classified placement. Sits at the crisp-and-orderly end of the grid, parallel to methodical and organized in usage.

Celtic
modifier

Latin Celticus, of-the-Celts. As a color modifier, celtic implies a knotwork-and-La-Tène quality, the visual register of Irish-and-Welsh-and-Scottish Celtic-knotwork hand-carved bronze-and-stone metalwork-and-illuminated-manuscript surfaces under Celtic-Irish-Welsh-Scottish illuminated-manuscript-tradition light. Sits at the modifier-and-cultural end of the grid, parallel to norse and welsh in usage.

Verdigris
noun

The basic copper carbonate that forms on weathered copper and bronze — the pigment scraped from oxidized metal and used in Renaissance painting before being supplanted by more stable greens. The color refers to a thick verdigris on aged copper roofing or the Statue of Liberty's surface: a soft, slightly muted blue-green with the powdery finish of mineral oxide. Cooler than patina, warmer than seafoam, with the archaeological weight of a mineral made by time.

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.

#3bbabb
Original
#aeb1bb
Protanopia
#9aa3bc
Deuteranopia
#00c0ba
Tritanopia
#9f9f9f
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).
Failon White
2.35:1
The quick brown foxSample body text at normal size. The wcag minimum for body contrast is 4.5:1 (AA) or 7:1 (AAA).
AAAon Black
8.93:1

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
##3BBABB
Display P3
Display P3
color(display-p3 0.3858 0.7194 0.7279)
P3 has subtle headroomOKLCH chroma 0.108

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.

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