Spangled Cardinalflower
Spangled Cardinalflower (#FD5253) is a true red 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 (360°, 98%, 66%) places it in the highly saturated band at a mid 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 cyan. For something softer, pull in its analogous neighbors on either side of the wheel.
Etymology
Middle Dutch spange, clasp / metal-disc — past-participle of spangle. As a color modifier, spangled implies a saturated-and-multi-point-reflective quality, the bright color of American-flag-stars and sequined-fabric metallic-disc-and-jewel-decoration. Sits at the bright-and-reflective end of the grid, parallel to glittering and sequined in usage.
Lobelia cardinalis, the North American wildflower whose tall spikes of brilliant red flowers are the favored nectar source of ruby-throated hummingbirds in late summer. The color refers to a fresh cardinalflower bloom: a saturated, slightly orange red with the satin finish of long-spurred bee-pollinated flower. Brighter than scarlet.
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.