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Delicate Kansas

#adaa8b
Notes

Delicate Kansas (#ADAA8B) is a true yellow 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 (55°, 17%, 61%) 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
#adaa8b
RGB
rgb(173, 170, 139)
HSL
hsl(55, 17%, 61%)
HWB
hwb(55 55% 32%)
OKLCH
oklch(73.2% 0.043 102.8)
P3
color(display-p3 0.6764 0.6671 0.5576)
HSV
hsv(55, 20%, 68%)
LAB
lab(69.11% -4.20 16.41)
LCH
lch(69.11% 16.93 104.35)
CMYK
cmyk(0%, 2%, 20%, 32%)

Etymology

Delicate
adjective

Latin dēlicātus, charming / refined. As a color modifier, delicate implies a pale-and-finely-detailed-and-careful quality where the hue carries the visual register of Wedgwood-and-Sèvres finely-detailed-and-carefully-painted porcelain-and-ceramic surface. Sits at the pale-and-delicate end of the grid, parallel to fragile and fine in usage.

Kansas
noun

The American Midwestern state — and the yellow of Kansas wheat at harvest, sunflower fields (Kansas is the Sunflower State), and the Yellow Brick Road of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. Kansas refers to a Kansas wheat field at midsummer: a soft, slightly muted warm yellow-tan with the matte finish of ripening grain.

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.

#adaa8b
Original
#b0a889
Protanopia
#b1aa8c
Deuteranopia
#b2a6a1
Tritanopia
#a8a8a8
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
2.36:1
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
8.90:1

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
##ADAA8B
Display P3
Display P3
color(display-p3 0.6764 0.6671 0.5576)
Inside sRGBOKLCH chroma 0.043

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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