Plainspoken Gown Turquoise

English compound plain + spoken — past-participle of speak. As a color modifier, plainspoken implies a clear-and-direct-and-straightforward quality where the hue carries the visual register of unembellished-honest declaration. Sits at the crisp-and-honest end of the grid, parallel to candid and direct in usage.

Old French goune, long-loose-garment. As a color modifier, gown implies a Tudor-and-Elizabethan-and-formal-evening-gown quality, the visual register of Tudor-and-Elizabethan-and-Worth-couture-gown hand-Tudor-and-Elizabethan-and-formal-evening-gown Tudor-and-Elizabethan-and-Worth-couture-gown-and-Belle-Époque gown-and-Tudor-and-Elizabethan surfaces under Tudor-and-Elizabethan-and-Worth-couture-gown-and-Belle-Époque Hampton-Court-and-Maison-Worth-Paris court-and-couture-light. Sits at the modifier-and-textile end of the grid, parallel to robe and frock 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.