Sterile Venus Turquoise

Latin sterilis, barren / not-fertile — sharing root with Greek steiros (barren). As a color modifier, sterile implies a clear-and-medical-clean-and-stripped quality, the crisp color of operating-theater surgical-environment white-and-stainless-steel surfaces. Sits at the crisp-and-clean end of the grid, parallel to sanitary and hygienic in usage.

Latin Venus, Roman-goddess-and-second-planet. As a color modifier, venus implies a Roman-goddess-and-second-planet-and-morning-evening-star quality, the visual register of Botticelli-Birth-of-Venus-and-Pompeii-fresco hand-Roman-goddess-and-second-planet-and-morning-evening-star Botticelli-Birth-of-Venus-and-Pompeii-fresco-and-Aphrodite-Hellenic venus-and-Roman-goddess-and-second-planet surfaces under Botticelli-Birth-of-Venus-and-Pompeii-fresco-and-Aphrodite-Hellenic Florentine-and-Pompeian dawn-and-dusk-evening-star-light. Sits at the modifier-and-zodiac end of the grid, parallel to jupiter and saturn 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.