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Sanitary Sway Verdigris

#44a9ab
Notes

Sanitary Sway Verdigris (#44A9AB) 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 (181°, 43%, 47%) 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
#44a9ab
RGB
rgb(68, 169, 171)
HSL
hsl(181, 43%, 47%)
HWB
hwb(181 27% 33%)
OKLCH
oklch(67.7% 0.093 197.0)
P3
color(display-p3 0.3780 0.6542 0.6656)
HSV
hsv(181, 60%, 67%)
LAB
lab(63.79% -28.24 -9.78)
LCH
lch(63.79% 29.89 199.10)
CMYK
cmyk(60%, 1%, 0%, 33%)

Etymology

Sanitary
adjective

Latin sānitās, health — adjectival suffix -ary. As a color modifier, sanitary implies a clear-and-clean-and-medical quality, the crisp color of Bauhaus-and-Modern clinical-and-hospital interior-architecture white-tile-and-stainless-steel surfaces. Sits at the crisp-and-clean end of the grid, parallel to hygienic and sterile in usage.

Sway
modifier

Middle English swēven, to-move-side-to-side. As a color modifier, sway implies a side-to-side-and-rocking-and-rhythmic quality, the visual register of willow-branch-and-tall-grass-sway hand-side-to-side-and-rocking-and-rhythmic willow-branch-and-tall-grass-and-pendulum-clock swayed-and-side-to-side-and-rocking-and-rhythmic surfaces under willow-branch-and-tall-grass-and-pendulum-clock breeze-rocked-and-pendulum-and-cradle riverbank-meadow-light. Sits at the modifier-and-mood end of the grid, parallel to drift and float 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.

#44a9ab
Original
#9ea2ab
Protanopia
#8e95ac
Deuteranopia
#00aea9
Tritanopia
#949494
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
2.80:1
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
7.51:1

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
##44A9AB
Display P3
Display P3
color(display-p3 0.3780 0.6542 0.6656)
P3 has subtle headroomOKLCH chroma 0.093

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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