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Organized Periwinkle

#8ab5e7
Notes

Organized Periwinkle (#8AB5E7) is a soft azure with a cool character. It leans cool, sitting on the blue, green, and violet side of the wheel. Quiet and dependable, a fit for product UI and data visualization. Its HSL profile (212°, 66%, 72%) places it in the balanced band at a light lightness. It works as a background wash, large-area fill, or soft illustration tone. Add a darker ink of the same hue when you need type over it. For a confident two-color system, pair it with its complementary orange. For something softer, pull in its analogous neighbors on either side of the wheel.

HEX
#8ab5e7
RGB
rgb(138, 181, 231)
HSL
hsl(212, 66%, 72%)
HWB
hwb(212 54% 9%)
OKLCH
oklch(76.1% 0.086 252.7)
P3
color(display-p3 0.5758 0.7050 0.8888)
HSV
hsv(212, 40%, 91%)
LAB
lab(72.37% -1.83 -29.55)
LCH
lch(72.37% 29.60 266.45)
CMYK
cmyk(40%, 22%, 0%, 9%)

Etymology

Organized
adjective

Greek órganon, instrument / tool — past-participle of organize. As a color modifier, organized implies a clear-and-coordinated-and-systematic quality where the hue carries the visual register of well-coordinated-and-classified arrangement. Sits at the crisp-and-orderly end of the grid, parallel to orderly and methodical in usage.

Periwinkle
noun

Vinca minor, the trailing groundcover of European woodland whose pale blue-violet flowers gave English the color name in the eighteenth century. Distinct from Catharanthus roseus (Madagascar periwinkle, the source of vincristine for chemotherapy). The color refers to the corolla of a fresh Vinca flower: a soft, slightly violet-shifted pale blue with the matte finish of five-petaled bloom. Lighter than bluebell, cooler than lavender.

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 explore

Harmonies

Accessibility

Color-vision simulation

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.

#8ab5e7
Original
#a2b7e9
Protanopia
#97ade6
Deuteranopia
#69c0c6
Tritanopia
#afafaf
Achromatopsia
WCAG contrast

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.

The quick brown foxSample body text at normal size. The wcag minimum for body contrast is 4.5:1 (AA) or 7:1 (AAA).
Failon White
2.13:1
The quick brown foxSample body text at normal size. The wcag minimum for body contrast is 4.5:1 (AA) or 7:1 (AAA).
AAAon Black
9.84:1

Wide gamut

Display P3 representation

The CSS Color 4 wide-gamut form of this color. Both swatches render the same color on every display — the P3 form only diverges from sRGB when a designer pushes channels outside sRGB's reach.

sRGB hex
sRGB hex
##8AB5E7
Display P3
Display P3
color(display-p3 0.5758 0.7050 0.8888)
P3 has subtle headroomOKLCH chroma 0.086

Moderately saturated colors gain a small bump in P3 — the difference is usually visible side-by-side on wide-gamut hardware but won't change the character of the color.

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