Hefty Spar Ruby
Hefty Spar Ruby (#990C20) is a deep red with a jewel character. It carries the deep, saturated richness of a gemstone. Authoritative and slightly formal, it works well for type and heavy UI elements. Its HSL profile (351°, 85%, 32%) places it in the highly saturated band at a dark lightness. Best used in small doses, like logos, CTAs, focus rings, or highlight text, where its saturation becomes a feature rather than noise. For a confident two-color system, pair it with its complementary teal. For something softer, pull in its analogous neighbors on either side of the wheel.
Etymology
Old English hefig, heavy — adjectival suffix -y. As a color modifier, hefty implies a saturated-and-substantial-and-weighty quality where the hue carries the visual heft of a hand-cast pig-iron object. Sits at the bold-and-weighty end of the grid, parallel to substantial and weighty in usage.
Old Norse sparri, long-pole. As a color modifier, spar implies a long-wooden-pole-for-sail quality, the visual register of Tall-Ship-and-Royal-Navy-spar hand-cut long-wooden-pole-and-spar-for-sail mast-and-yard-and-boom maritime-rigging surfaces under tall-ship-spar-and-yard maritime-rigging light. Sits at the modifier-and-nautical end of the grid, parallel to mast and boom in usage.
From the Latin ruber — simply, red. The gemstone is a chromium-tinged corundum, harder than anything in nature except diamond, and so saturated that a fine Burmese pigeon's blood ruby at auction outpaces a comparable diamond by weight. The color borrows the gem's confidence: a clear, glassy red without the brown of garnet or the blue of crimson.
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.