Plumb Joy Turquoise

Latin plumbum, lead — referring to the lead-weighted plumb-line of pre-modern carpentry. As a color modifier, plumb implies a clear-and-vertical-true quality where the hue carries the visual register of gravity-aligned-and-perfectly-vertical surface. Sits at the crisp-and-balanced end of the grid, parallel to level and squared in usage.

Latin gaudia, delights. As a color modifier, joy implies a bright-and-radiant-and-uplifted quality, the visual register of Provençal-troubadour-and-Florentine-Carnival-joy hand-bright-and-radiant-and-uplifted Provençal-troubadour-and-Florentine-Carnival-and-Renaissance-festa joyful-and-bright-and-radiant-and-uplifted surfaces under Provençal-troubadour-and-Florentine-Carnival-and-Renaissance-festa banner-and-procession-and-piazza festival-day-light. Sits at the modifier-and-mood end of the grid, parallel to bliss and glee in usage.

The hydrated copper-aluminum phosphate mined in Persia and the American Southwest for thousands of years — the firuze of Iran, the chalchihuitl of Mesoamerica, the heart of Pueblo and Navajo silverwork. The color refers to a fine Sleeping Beauty turquoise from Arizona: a saturated, slightly green-shifted blue with the slight matrix of host-rock veining. Brighter than persian, lighter than cerulean.