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Bulky Gable Crimson

#ae281f
Notes

Bulky Gable Crimson (#AE281F) is a true red with a vibrant character. It holds its own as a focal accent, carrying visual weight without tipping into neon territory. Its HSL profile (4°, 70%, 40%) 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 cyan. For something softer, pull in its analogous neighbors on either side of the wheel.

HEX
#ae281f
RGB
rgb(174, 40, 31)
HSL
hsl(4, 70%, 40%)
HWB
hwb(4 12% 32%)
OKLCH
oklch(49.4% 0.172 28.9)
P3
color(display-p3 0.6277 0.2046 0.1570)
HSV
hsv(4, 82%, 68%)
LAB
lab(38.93% 52.81 38.84)
LCH
lch(38.93% 65.56 36.33)
CMYK
cmyk(0%, 77%, 82%, 32%)

Etymology

Bulky
adjective

Old Norse búlki, cargo / mass — adjectival suffix -y. As a color modifier, bulky implies a saturated-and-massive-and-occupying quality where the hue takes up visual space with broad-and-heavy presence. Sits at the bold-and-weighty end of the grid, parallel to hefty and substantial in usage.

Gable
modifier

Old French gable, triangular-end-of-pitched-roof. As a color modifier, gable implies a triangular-end-of-pitched-roof quality, the visual register of English-and-Tudor-and-Pennsylvania-Dutch-gable hand-built triangular-pitched-roof gable-and-dormer architectural surfaces under English-and-Tudor-and-Dutch gable-end light. Sits at the modifier-and-architecture end of the grid, parallel to eave and truss in usage.

Crimson
noun

From the Old Spanish cremesin, itself from the Arabic qirmiz — the kermes scale insect, dried and ground into a brilliant carmine dye prized in the medieval Mediterranean. For centuries the most expensive red on a draper's shelf, reserved for cardinals, kings, and the cloth that gave English the word crimson. Cooler than scarlet, deeper than rose; the color of pomegranate seeds and a serious occasion.

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.

#ae281f
Original
#52491c
Protanopia
#736618
Deuteranopia
#c00028
Tritanopia
#444444
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).
AAon White
6.72:1
The quick brown foxSample body text at normal size. The wcag minimum for body contrast is 4.5:1 (AA) or 7:1 (AAA).
AA Largeon Black
3.12:1

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
##AE281F
Display P3
Display P3
color(display-p3 0.6277 0.2046 0.1570)
P3 has subtle headroomOKLCH chroma 0.172

Moderately saturated colors gain a small bump in P3 — the difference is usually visible side-by-side on wide-gamut hardware but won't change the character of the color.

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