Azure (color)

Azure (color)

Azure #007FFF

Azure is a color that is commonly compared to the color of the sky on a summer's day.

On the RGB color wheel, "azure" (color #007FFF) is defined as the color at 210 degrees, i.e., the hue halfway between blue and cyan.

In the X11 color system which became a standard for early web colors, azure is depicted as a pale cyan color.

Azure also describes the color of the mineral azurite, both in its natural form and as a pigment in various paint formulations. In order to preserve its deep color, azurite was ground coarsely. Fine-ground azurite produces a lighter, washed-out color. Traditionally, the pigment was considered unstable in oil paints, and was sometimes isolated from other colors and not mixed. Modern investigation of old paintings, however, shows that the pigment is very stable unless exposed to sulfur fumes.

In Russian, "голубой" (goluboj, azure or cyan) and "синий" (sinij, blue or navy blue) are not two shades of the same color, but distinguished in the way red and pink are distinct colors in English. A similar distinction exists between "azzurro" (azure, but used to indicate various shades of light blue) and "blu" (blue) in Italian and "ฟ้า (fah, sky blue) and น้ำเงิน (nam ngoen, blue) in Thai.