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Trustworthy Vanilla

#e9e09f
Notes

Trustworthy Vanilla (#E9E09F) 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 (53°, 63%, 77%) places it in the balanced 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 blue. For something softer, pull in its analogous neighbors on either side of the wheel.

HEX
#e9e09f
RGB
rgb(233, 224, 159)
HSL
hsl(53, 63%, 77%)
HWB
hwb(53 62% 9%)
OKLCH
oklch(89.9% 0.084 101.2)
P3
color(display-p3 0.9076 0.8796 0.6527)
HSV
hsv(53, 32%, 91%)
LAB
lab(88.51% -6.57 33.00)
LCH
lch(88.51% 33.65 101.26)
CMYK
cmyk(0%, 4%, 32%, 9%)

Etymology

Trustworthy
adjective

Old English trēow, trust — adjectival suffix -worthy. As a color modifier, trustworthy implies a clear-and-reliable-and-honest quality where the hue carries the visual register of confidence-deserving-and-faithful-performance design-element. Sits at the crisp-and-honest end of the grid, parallel to reliable and dependable in usage.

Vanilla
noun

Vanilla planifolia, the climbing orchid native to Mexico whose cured seed pods yield the world's second-most-expensive spice (after saffron). The color vanilla refers to the pale yellow-cream of a fresh vanilla cream filling: a soft, very pale slightly warm off-white with the matte finish of egg-and-cream emulsion. Warmer than cream, 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.

#e9e09f
Original
#ecdc9b
Protanopia
#efe0a1
Deuteranopia
#f4d7cf
Tritanopia
#dddddd
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
1.34:1
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
15.63:1

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
##E9E09F
Display P3
Display P3
color(display-p3 0.9076 0.8796 0.6527)
P3 has subtle headroomOKLCH chroma 0.084

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.

Related Colors

Canvas