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Workmanlike Crepuscule

#b4abe9
Notes

Workmanlike Crepuscule (#B4ABE9) is a soft blue with a pastel character. It reads calm and airy, with enough chroma to feel intentional rather than washed out. Its HSL profile (249°, 58%, 79%) 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 yellow. For something softer, pull in its analogous neighbors on either side of the wheel.

HEX
#b4abe9
RGB
rgb(180, 171, 233)
HSL
hsl(249, 58%, 79%)
HWB
hwb(249 67% 9%)
OKLCH
oklch(77.1% 0.088 290.8)
P3
color(display-p3 0.6998 0.6718 0.8958)
HSV
hsv(249, 27%, 91%)
LAB
lab(72.70% 16.09 -29.89)
LCH
lch(72.70% 33.94 298.29)
CMYK
cmyk(23%, 27%, 0%, 9%)

Etymology

Workmanlike
adjective

Old English weorcmann, workman — adjectival suffix -like. As a color modifier, workmanlike implies a clear-and-skilled-and-honest quality where the hue carries the visual register of journeyman-craftsman careful-and-competent hand-built craft. Sits at the crisp-and-functional end of the grid, parallel to functional and practical in usage.

Crepuscule
noun

Latin crepusculum, twilight — adopted into French and English for the precise civil-twilight half-hour between sunset and nightfall. Crepuscule color refers to a clear-sky eastern anti-solar horizon at civil crepuscule (twelve minutes after sundown): a saturated, slightly cool deep blue-violet with the optical complexity of Rayleigh-scattered Belt of Venus light against the deepening Earth shadow.

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.

#b4abe9
Original
#9cb3ec
Protanopia
#9cb1e7
Deuteranopia
#a9b5c1
Tritanopia
#b1b1b1
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
2.11:1
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
9.94:1

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
##B4ABE9
Display P3
Display P3
color(display-p3 0.6998 0.6718 0.8958)
P3 has subtle headroomOKLCH chroma 0.088

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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