Aligned Sleek Sky

French à-ligne, to-line-up — past-participle of align. As a color modifier, aligned implies a clear-and-axis-coordinated quality where the hue carries the visual register of carefully-parallel-arranged elements. Sits at the crisp-and-balanced end of the grid, parallel to symmetrical and squared in usage.

Middle Dutch sleeck, smooth. As a color modifier, sleek implies a smooth-and-streamlined quality, the visual register of Mid-Century-Modern-and-Streamline-Moderne-sleek hand-streamlined-and-aerodynamic-and-polished aluminum-and-chrome-and-bakelite Mid-Century-Modern-and-Streamline-Moderne sleek-and-streamlined surfaces under Mid-Century-Modern-and-Streamline-Moderne sleek-and-polished light. Sits at the modifier-and-texture end of the grid, parallel to gloss and shine in usage.

The blue of a clear sky at noon — produced by Rayleigh scattering, the preferential dispersion of shorter wavelengths through atmospheric molecules. Air itself is colorless; the color we see is sunlight scattered toward our eyes by every cubic kilometer above. The reference shade is mid-latitude noon under a high pressure system: a clean, slightly green-shifted blue with the luminous depth of light scattered across an entire hemisphere of air.