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Direct Frangipani

#c278b4
Notes

Direct Frangipani (#C278B4) is a true magenta with a cool character. It leans cool, sitting on the blue, green, and violet side of the wheel. Quiet and dependable, a fit for product UI and data visualization. Its HSL profile (311°, 38%, 62%) 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 green. For something softer, pull in its analogous neighbors on either side of the wheel.

HEX
#c278b4
RGB
rgb(194, 120, 180)
HSL
hsl(311, 38%, 62%)
HWB
hwb(311 47% 24%)
OKLCH
oklch(67.1% 0.121 334.0)
P3
color(display-p3 0.7200 0.4840 0.6932)
HSV
hsv(311, 38%, 76%)
LAB
lab(60.07% 37.87 -19.63)
LCH
lch(60.07% 42.65 332.60)
CMYK
cmyk(0%, 38%, 7%, 24%)

Etymology

Direct
adjective

From the Latin directus, straight — used as a color modifier since the eighteenth century for hues that read as straightforward and unambiguous. Direct red, direct green: moderate-to-high saturation combined with optical clarity. Sits at the crisp-bucket center alongside clear and frank.

Frangipani
noun

Caribbean and Polynesian Plumeria rubra — a tropical Apocynaceae tree cultivated worldwide for its highly fragrant five-petaled flowers in deep-magenta cultivars. The flowers are used in Hawaiian lei and Hindu garlands. Frangipani color refers to a freshly opened Plumeria rubra deep-magenta flower: a saturated, slightly cool deep magenta with the velvet finish of overlapping fleshy five-petaled corolla. Named for the Italian noble family that invented the perfume.

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.

#c278b4
Original
#788ab6
Protanopia
#8a95b2
Deuteranopia
#c97c8e
Tritanopia
#8c8c8c
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).
AA Largeon White
3.16:1
The quick brown foxSample body text at normal size. The wcag minimum for body contrast is 4.5:1 (AA) or 7:1 (AAA).
AAon Black
6.64:1

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
##C278B4
Display P3
Display P3
color(display-p3 0.7200 0.4840 0.6932)
P3 has subtle headroomOKLCH chroma 0.121

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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