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Steady Andalusite

#af9a56
Notes

Steady Andalusite (#AF9A56) 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 (46°, 36%, 51%) 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 blue. For something softer, pull in its analogous neighbors on either side of the wheel.

HEX
#af9a56
RGB
rgb(175, 154, 86)
HSL
hsl(46, 36%, 51%)
HWB
hwb(46 34% 31%)
OKLCH
oklch(69.0% 0.091 92.7)
P3
color(display-p3 0.6726 0.6069 0.3741)
HSV
hsv(46, 51%, 69%)
LAB
lab(64.08% -1.31 38.28)
LCH
lch(64.08% 38.30 91.95)
CMYK
cmyk(0%, 12%, 51%, 31%)

Etymology

Steady
adjective

Old English stede, place, position — drifted to mean firm and unmoving. Used as a color modifier since the seventeenth century for hues that read as reliable rather than dramatic. Steady gray, steady green: moderate saturation combined with optical calmness. Sits in the crisp-bucket center alongside settled.

Andalusite
noun

An aluminum silicate gem — pleochroic from yellow-brown to gold-green to red-brown depending on viewing angle. Mined principally in Brazil and Sri Lanka. The color refers to a faceted Brazilian andalusite seen along its strong axis: a soft, slightly muted warm gold-brown with the optical complexity of pleochroic stone.

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.

#af9a56
Original
#a79850
Protanopia
#ac9e59
Deuteranopia
#bb908a
Tritanopia
#9a9a9a
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
2.77:1
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
7.58:1

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
##AF9A56
Display P3
Display P3
color(display-p3 0.6726 0.6069 0.3741)
P3 has subtle headroomOKLCH chroma 0.091

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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