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Sharp Rush

#a1e987
Notes

Sharp Rush (#A1E987) is a soft green 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 (104°, 69%, 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 violet. For something softer, pull in its analogous neighbors on either side of the wheel.

HEX
#a1e987
RGB
rgb(161, 233, 135)
HSL
hsl(104, 69%, 72%)
HWB
hwb(104 53% 9%)
OKLCH
oklch(86.4% 0.148 137.8)
HSV
hsv(104, 42%, 91%)
LAB
lab(85.81% -40.08 40.61)
LCH
lch(85.81% 57.06 134.62)
CMYK
cmyk(31%, 0%, 42%, 9%)

Etymology

Sharp
adjective

Old English scearp, cutting, pointed — applied metaphorically to color since the seventeenth century for hues that read as definite and edge-defined. Sharp red, sharp green: the implication is saturation combined with high-contrast crispness. Sits in the bright-bucket center alongside crisp and clear, with a slightly more incisive edge.

Rush
noun

The genus Juncus — wetland sedge-family plants whose hollow green stems were used historically for rushlights (torches dipped in tallow) and traditional weaving. The color refers to a clump of fresh rushes in a damp meadow: a saturated, slightly cool deep yellow-green with the matte finish of round hollow stalks.

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

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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.

#a1e987
Original
#efdb80
Protanopia
#e4d48d
Deuteranopia
#9ee3d1
Tritanopia
#d3d3d3
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
1.45:1
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
14.52:1

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