Buzzing Damson
Buzzing Damson (#D092FE) is a soft indigo with a pastel character. It reads calm and airy, with enough chroma to feel intentional rather than washed out. Its HSL profile (274°, 98%, 78%) places it in the highly saturated band at a light lightness. Best used in small doses, like logos, CTAs, focus rings, or highlight text, where its saturation becomes a feature rather than noise. For a confident two-color system, pair it with its complementary lime. For something softer, pull in its analogous neighbors on either side of the wheel.
Etymology
The progressive participle of buzz — borrowed metaphorically as a color word since the late twentieth century for hues that read as visually loud and slightly destabilizing. Buzzing yellow, buzzing magenta: the implication is saturation pushed past comfortable into the realm of optical agitation. Sits at the bright-bucket extreme alongside electric.
Prunus domestica subsp. insititia, the small dark plum of European orchards — too tart to eat fresh but unmatched for jam, gin-flavoring, and English plum pudding. Named for Damascus, the city through which it spread westward in antiquity. The color refers to a ripe damson on the tree: a deep, slightly red-shifted purple-black with the heavy bloom of waxy fruit surface. Deeper than plum, cooler than wine.
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.