Exploring the Color #553F36

#553F36 sits at 17° on the color wheel, placing it in the orange family of the warm half of the spectrum. With 22% saturation and 27% lightness, it reads as a softly muted, shadowed tone — a balanced mid-energy presence that sits comfortably alongside other UI tones. Its RGB mix of 85, 63, 54 produces a 9.77:1 contrast ratio against white, which clears WCAG AAA for body text in that pairing.

In RGB space #553F36 is a distant relative of CSS dim gray — about 69 units away from #696969. Designers reach for orange hues at this saturation when the brief calls for restraint and atmosphere, and at this lightness when they want weight, depth, and grounded contrast. On screen the warm cast tends to pair best with cool neutrals around 210°-230° to balance temperature.

Darkening Shades

Lightening Shades