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Clear Lambswool

#a09c90
Notes

Clear Lambswool (#A09C90) is a true amber with a warm character. It leans warm, pulling light toward red, orange, and yellow. Naturally inviting, it suits editorial and hospitality contexts. Its HSL profile (45°, 8%, 60%) places it in the muted 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 blue. For something softer, pull in its analogous neighbors on either side of the wheel.

HEX
#a09c90
RGB
rgb(160, 156, 144)
HSL
hsl(45, 8%, 60%)
HWB
hwb(45 56% 37%)
OKLCH
oklch(69.3% 0.018 91.6)
P3
color(display-p3 0.6247 0.6123 0.5694)
HSV
hsv(45, 10%, 63%)
LAB
lab(64.37% -0.72 6.80)
LCH
lch(64.37% 6.84 96.07)
CMYK
cmyk(0%, 2%, 10%, 37%)

Etymology

Clear
adjective

From the Latin clarus, bright, distinct — used as a color modifier since the medieval period for hues without haze or mixing. Clear blue sky, clear green water: the implication is moderate saturation combined with optical clarity. Sits at the crisp-bucket center alongside clean and true.

Lambswool
noun

The wool from a sheep's first shearing — softer, finer, and slightly creamier than the regrown adult fleece. Lambswool as a color refers to undyed handspun lambswool yarn: a soft, very pale slightly warm cream-gray with the slightly fuzzy matte finish of natural fiber before bleaching. Warmer than linen, cooler than cream.

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.

#a09c90
Original
#9f9b8f
Protanopia
#a09d90
Deuteranopia
#a39a99
Tritanopia
#9c9c9c
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
2.74:1
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
7.65:1

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
##A09C90
Display P3
Display P3
color(display-p3 0.6247 0.6123 0.5694)
Inside sRGBOKLCH chroma 0.018

This color sits well within the sRGB cube. P3 and sRGB share the gray axis and most desaturated tones, so a P3 display renders this identically to an sRGB display.

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