Thistle

#bf9cae

Hex, rgb, cmyk and Pantone values for thistle, with shades, tints, matching colors and free print quality patterns.

Thistle sits in the pink band, mid and muted. Pinks like this read soft and contemporary. It works with sage and olive for balance, or with cream for a gentle palette.

Thistle color values

Every conversion for #bf9cae, ready to copy. Hex, rgb, hsl, hsv, cmyk, cie-lab, xyz, decimal, web safe and the nearest Pantone.

Hex#bf9cae

RGB191, 156, 174

HSL329, 21%, 68%

HSV329, 18%, 75%

CMYK0%, 18%, 9%, 25%

Lab67.95, 15.97, -4.45

XYZ41.01, 37.91, 45.2

Decimal12557486

Web safe#cc9999

Pantone522 C

Shades of thistle

#b3899e #a6768f #99637f #86576f #734a5f #5f3e4f #4c313f #39252f #26181f #130c0f

Tints of thistle

#c5a5b5 #caaebc #d0b6c4 #d6bfcb #dbc8d2 #e1d1d9 #e7dae0 #ede3e8 #f2ebef #f8f4f6

Colors that go with thistle

Complementary#9cbfad Analogous#be9cbf Analogous#bf9c9d Triadic#aebf9c Triadic#9caebf Split complementary#9dbf9c Split complementary#9cbfbe

Thistle in print

It sits in a comfortable part of the gamut and reproduces reliably on press. The cmyk build is 0, 18, 9, 25.

The same color needs a different cmyk build depending on the paper. Here is #bf9cae on both.

Coated stockgloss or silk, C

0 18 9 25

Ink sits on the surface, so colors stay bright and close to screen.

Uncoated stocknatural or matte, U

4 21 12 31

The stock absorbs ink and gains dot, so it needs a heavier build and reads a touch softer.

This color converts to cmyk comfortably and should hold on press.

See how it converts in the rgb to cmyk converter, or read rgb vs cmyk for print and what the k in cmyk means.

Thistle in css

Copy #bf9cae straight into your stylesheet.

.background { background-color: #bf9cae; }
.text { color: #bf9cae; }
.border { border: 2px solid #bf9cae; }

How thistle looks on light and dark

Sample text on black

Sample text on white

Text on this color

Thistle and accessibility

Contrast ratios for #bf9cae against black and white text, measured to the WCAG standard.

Use black text on this color for readable body copy. To test #bf9cae against any other color, not just black and white, run the pair through our contrast checker for a live WCAG reading.

Thistle on a business card, sticker and pattern

A quick look at how #bf9cae sits on real print products. Start any of these in the maker.

Business card

Sticker

Repeat pattern

Building a full palette around thistle? Pull matching colors from any photo with the color palette generator, or check a design for print with the rgb to cmyk converter.

Turn thistle into a seamless pattern

Four patterns built from #bf9cae and its shades, free at print quality. Click any one to keep editing in the pattern maker.

Arches Signature stripes Gem Shingles

Make posters, wallpaper and packaging art from thistle, free and print ready.

Open in pattern maker

How we calculate these values

The figures for #bf9cae come from standard color math, shown so you can check them. We convert from sRGB to each space with the standard formulas, so the codes match what design tools show. Two cmyk builds are shown because coated and uncoated papers behave differently, uncoated soaks up ink and needs more of it to hit the same target. The Pantone value is the closest reference by perceptual color distance and should be treated as a starting point, not a guaranteed match.