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Serene Sand

#edd281
Notes

Serene Sand (#EDD281) 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 (45°, 75%, 72%) 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
#edd281
RGB
rgb(237, 210, 129)
HSL
hsl(45, 75%, 72%)
HWB
hwb(45 51% 7%)
OKLCH
oklch(86.9% 0.105 91.6)
HSV
hsv(45, 46%, 93%)
LAB
lab(84.84% -1.15 43.45)
LCH
lch(84.84% 43.47 91.52)
CMYK
cmyk(0%, 11%, 46%, 7%)

Etymology

Serene
adjective

Latin serēnus, clear / unclouded. As a color modifier, serene implies a clear-and-untroubled quality where the hue carries the visual register of cloudless-bright-day atmospheric stability. Sits at the crisp-and-calm end of the grid, parallel to placid and untroubled in usage.

Sand
noun

Quartz weathered to grain — the residue of geologic time at the granular scale. Beach sand color depends entirely on the source: white from Caribbean coral, black from Hawaiian basalt, red from Australian iron oxide. The reference shade is the warm, slightly golden tan of a temperate Atlantic beach: medium-saturation, matte, with the optical brightness of small mineral particles in sunlight.

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.

#edd281
Original
#e2cf7b
Protanopia
#e9d784
Deuteranopia
#fcc6be
Tritanopia
#d2d2d2
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
1.49:1
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
14.14:1

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