Firm Plinth Ruby
Firm Plinth Ruby (#CA1E50) is a true red with a vibrant character. It holds its own as a focal accent, carrying visual weight without tipping into neon territory. Its HSL profile (343°, 74%, 45%) 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 teal. For something softer, pull in its analogous neighbors on either side of the wheel.
Etymology
Latin firmus, strong / stable — sharing root with English farm (originally a fixed-yearly-rental). As a color modifier, firm implies a saturated-and-resolute quality where the hue holds its visual position without wavering. Sits at the bold-and-firm end of the grid, parallel to steadfast and unwavering in usage.
Greek plinthos, brick / base. As a color modifier, plinth implies a column-base-and-pedestal quality, the visual register of Greek-and-Roman-Plinth hand-cut column-base-and-statue-pedestal Doric-and-Ionic-and-Corinthian classical-plinth architectural surfaces under classical-plinth column-base light. Sits at the modifier-and-architecture end of the grid, parallel to pillar and column in usage.
From the Latin ruber — simply, red. The gemstone is a chromium-tinged corundum, harder than anything in nature except diamond, and so saturated that a fine Burmese pigeon's blood ruby at auction outpaces a comparable diamond by weight. The color borrows the gem's confidence: a clear, glassy red without the brown of garnet or the blue of crimson.
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 exploreHarmonies
Accessibility
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.
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.
Wide gamut
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.
This color is chromatic enough that authoring it as P3 native (instead of clamping to sRGB) gives a perceptibly more saturated render on wide-gamut displays — modern Macs, iPhones, iPads, and most recent OLED laptops.