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Incandescent Mater Goldenrod

#d8ce50
Notes

Incandescent Mater Goldenrod (#D8CE50) is a true yellow 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 (56°, 64%, 58%) 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 blue. For something softer, pull in its analogous neighbors on either side of the wheel.

HEX
#d8ce50
RGB
rgb(216, 206, 80)
HSL
hsl(56, 64%, 58%)
HWB
hwb(56 31% 15%)
OKLCH
oklch(83.6% 0.145 104.8)
P3
color(display-p3 0.8403 0.8092 0.3951)
HSV
hsv(56, 63%, 85%)
LAB
lab(81.47% -11.60 61.84)
LCH
lch(81.47% 62.92 100.63)
CMYK
cmyk(0%, 5%, 63%, 15%)

Etymology

Incandescent
adjective

Latin incandēscēns, growing-hot — present-participle of incandēscere, sharing root with candere (to shine). As a color modifier, incandescent implies a saturated-and-glowing-hot quality, the bright color of tungsten-filament-glow incandescent-lamp light. Sits at the bright-and-warm end of the grid, parallel to glowing and blazing in usage.

Mater
modifier

Latin mater, mother. As a color modifier, mater implies a Latin-mother-and-Stabat-Mater-and-Madonna quality, the visual register of Stabat-Mater-and-Pietà-mater hand-Latin-mother-and-Stabat-Mater-and-Madonna Stabat-Mater-and-Pietà-mater-and-Marian-iconography mater-and-Latin-mother surfaces under Stabat-Mater-and-Pietà-mater-and-Marian-iconography Roman-and-Counter-Reformation Madonna-iconographic-light. Sits at the modifier-and-Latin end of the grid, parallel to pater and amor in usage.

Goldenrod
noun

Solidago, the late-summer wildflower of North American meadows whose tall sprays of small yellow flowers signal the end of the growing season. The color refers to the flower head at full bloom: a warm, slightly muted yellow-orange with the matte finish of small clustered florets. Cooler than mustard, deeper than dandelion. The state flower of Kentucky and Nebraska, a pollinator magnet, and the original native dye for early American homespun.

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.

#d8ce50
Original
#dfc740
Protanopia
#e3cd57
Deuteranopia
#e7c1b4
Tritanopia
#c7c7c7
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
1.63:1
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
12.86:1

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
##D8CE50
Display P3
Display P3
color(display-p3 0.8403 0.8092 0.3951)
P3 has subtle headroomOKLCH chroma 0.145

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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