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Frosty Bath

#c9bca4
Notes

Frosty Bath (#C9BCA4) is a soft 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 (39°, 26%, 72%) places it in the muted 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 azure. For something softer, pull in its analogous neighbors on either side of the wheel.

HEX
#c9bca4
RGB
rgb(201, 188, 164)
HSL
hsl(39, 26%, 72%)
HWB
hwb(39 64% 21%)
OKLCH
oklch(80.0% 0.036 82.9)
P3
color(display-p3 0.7795 0.7390 0.6533)
HSV
hsv(39, 18%, 79%)
LAB
lab(76.72% 0.64 13.81)
LCH
lch(76.72% 13.82 87.33)
CMYK
cmyk(0%, 6%, 18%, 21%)

Etymology

Frosty
adjective

Old English forst, frost — adjectival suffix -y. As a color modifier, frosty implies a pale-and-cool-and-icy quality, the pale color of Cotswold-stone-wall-fence-post dendritic-ice-crystal hoarfrost-deposit atmospheric-condition. Sits at the pale-and-cool end of the grid, parallel to wintry and icy in usage.

Bath
noun

The English Roman-spa city — and the cream-tan of Bath stone, the oolitic limestone used in the city's Georgian terraces and the Royal Crescent. The color refers to the south-facing facade of the Royal Crescent at midday: a soft, slightly cool warm cream-tan with the matte finish of Bath stone. Lighter than Cotswold, cooler than honey.

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.

#c9bca4
Original
#c2bba3
Protanopia
#c6bfa5
Deuteranopia
#d0b8b5
Tritanopia
#bdbdbd
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
1.87:1
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
11.21:1

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
##C9BCA4
Display P3
Display P3
color(display-p3 0.7795 0.7390 0.6533)
Inside sRGBOKLCH chroma 0.036

This color sits well within the sRGB cube. P3 and sRGB share the gray axis and most desaturated tones, so a P3 display renders this identically to an sRGB display.

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