Shielded Aronia
Shielded Aronia (#9E40BA) is a true violet with an earthy character. It leans grounded and natural, the kind of color that plays well with wood, clay, linen, and warm neutrals. Its HSL profile (286°, 49%, 49%) places it in the balanced band at a mid lightness. It works across type, buttons, and borders, saturated enough to feel deliberate but balanced enough to not fight the rest of the palette. For a confident two-color system, pair it with its complementary green. For something softer, pull in its analogous neighbors on either side of the wheel.
Etymology
Old English scild, shield — past-participle of shield, sharing root with German Schild. As a color modifier, shielded implies a saturated-and-protected-and-defensive quality, the deep-rich color of medieval-knight armorial-shield-and-coat-of-arms heraldic display. Sits at the bold-and-fortified end of the grid, parallel to armored and bastioned.
North American chokeberry (Aronia melanocarpa) — a Rosaceae shrub native to eastern North America whose deep-violet drupes are the most polyphenol-rich of any commonly cultivated berry. Aronia color refers to a freshly picked Aronia melanocarpa drupe-cluster: a saturated, slightly cool deep violet with the matte finish of anthocyanin-and-tannin-rich chokeberry. The genus name comes from the Greek aría, small fruit-bush.
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.