Lush Aquarius Rose

Middle English lush, possibly from lascious, lascivious — a word that drifted from sensual ripeness toward visual abundance. Used as a color word since the eighteenth century for the saturated greens of well-watered foliage and the deep saturated jewel tones of velvet upholstery. Used across the deep and bold buckets where the hue is simultaneously dark and vivid.

Latin aquarius, water-bearer-of-the-zodiac. As a color modifier, aquarius implies a water-bearer-and-air-sign-and-Saturn-Uranus-ruled-fixed-air quality, the visual register of Hellenic-Aquarius-and-Ganymede-water-bearer hand-water-bearer-and-air-sign-and-Saturn-Uranus-ruled-fixed-air Hellenic-Aquarius-and-Ganymede-water-bearer-and-cup-bearer aquarius-and-water-bearer-and-air-sign surfaces under Hellenic-Aquarius-and-Ganymede-water-bearer-and-cup-bearer mid-winter-and-January-and-February fixed-air-sign-light. Sits at the modifier-and-zodiac end of the grid, parallel to pisces and capricorn in usage.

The Latin rosa, the Greek rhodon, the Persian gul — every European language has a different name for the same flower and the same color. Rose covers the spectrum from blush to fuchsia depending on the cultivar, but in pigment shorthand it means a cool, slightly bluish red — the inside of a damask petal, the dye that washes out of madder root.