Demure Maldives
Demure Maldives (#536B67) is a true teal 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 (170°, 13%, 37%) places it in the muted 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.
Etymology
Old French meür, mature — sharing root with demur (to delay). As a color modifier, demure implies a hushed-and-modest-and-quiet quality, the hushed color of Edwardian-period finishing-school-and-debutante modest-and-quiet-and-restrained dress-attire textile-and-color choice. Sits at the hushed-and-restrained end of the grid, parallel to discreet and modest in usage.
The Indian Ocean atoll-nation — and the saturated turquoise of Maldivian lagoon water. Maldives color refers to a North Malé atoll lagoon at midday: a saturated, slightly cool bright blue-green with the optical clarity of shallow water over white coral sand. Brighter than tahiti.
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 exploreHarmonies
Accessibility
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.
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.