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Sheer Beeswing

#ac967b
Notes

Sheer Beeswing (#AC967B) is a true orange 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 (33°, 23%, 58%) 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 azure. For something softer, pull in its analogous neighbors on either side of the wheel.

HEX
#ac967b
RGB
rgb(172, 150, 123)
HSL
hsl(33, 23%, 58%)
HWB
hwb(33 48% 33%)
OKLCH
oklch(68.6% 0.046 72.6)
P3
color(display-p3 0.6602 0.5914 0.4950)
HSV
hsv(33, 28%, 67%)
LAB
lab(63.35% 3.95 17.27)
LCH
lch(63.35% 17.71 77.12)
CMYK
cmyk(0%, 13%, 28%, 33%)

Etymology

Sheer
adjective

Old English scīr, clear, pure — used as a color modifier since the eighteenth century for hues with the optical translucency of fine fabric. Sheer white, sheer blue: very low saturation combined with the optical impression of fabric with low fiber density. Sits at the pale-bucket alongside diaphanous.

Beeswing
noun

The thin, glassy crust that forms on the inside of a long-aged port or sherry bottle — fragments break loose like the wings of bees as the wine ages. The color refers to a beeswing-rich vintage port: a deep, slightly muted warm gold-brown with the optical complexity of long-cellar-aged fortified wine.

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.

#ac967b
Original
#9e9679
Protanopia
#a49b7c
Deuteranopia
#b4908f
Tritanopia
#999999
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
2.84:1
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
7.40:1

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
##AC967B
Display P3
Display P3
color(display-p3 0.6602 0.5914 0.4950)
Inside sRGBOKLCH chroma 0.046

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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