Tints & Shades
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Scale from white (50) through Wood Brown (500) to black (900), interpolated in Lab color space.
Color Values
- HEX
- #927052
- RGB
- rgb(146, 112, 82)
- HSL
- hsl(28, 28%, 45%)
- OKLCH
- oklch(0.571 0.061 63)
- CMYK
- cmyk(0%, 23%, 44%, 43%)
--color-wood-brownbg-[#927052]Accessibility
Score: 54/100On White (#FFF)
4.5:1
On Black (#000)
4.66:1
On Light Gray (#F5F5F5)
4.13:1
Best text color on this background:
Design Applications
background-color: #927052
color: #927052
bg-[#927052] text-[#000000]
border-left: 4px solid #927052
Color Harmonies
Complementary
Alice Blue
#F0F8FF
Split-Complementary
Similar Colors
Color Meaning & Psychology
Brown is the color of earth, wood, and food — the most organic color in the spectrum. It conveys honesty, dependability, and unpretentiousness. Unlike the engineered precision of black, brown's warmth feels handmade and authentic. Coffee culture has made brown aspirational in ways it never was in the 20th century; the smell and warmth of a coffee shop is inseparable from its brown palette. Darker, richer browns signal luxury craft — leather, walnut, dark chocolate. Lighter sandy browns feel outdoor, regional, and approachable. Brown's weakness is its association with dirt and decay in medical contexts, where it is largely avoided. At medium lightness, it is the most versatile tone of this hue family — readable as text on light backgrounds, yet vibrant enough as a visual accent.
Industry Usage
Common contexts and industries where Wood Brown is applied in professional design.
- Coffee shops and specialty beverage brands
- Chocolate and premium confectionery
- Outdoor gear and hiking equipment
- Furniture and home furnishing brands
- Craft beer and artisanal food products
- Leather goods and accessories
- Organic and natural food products
- Heritage and classic whiskey/spirits brands
Accessibility Considerations
Normal Text
Passes AA
4.5:1 minimum required
Large Text
Passes AA Large
3:1 minimum required
UI Components
Meets 1.4.11
3:1 for non-text UI
Wood Brown is a light color. Use black (#000000) text on top of it for maximum readability (4.66:1). Avoid white text on this background.
CSS & Code Examples
Background
background-color: #927052;Text
color: #927052;Border
border: 2px solid #927052;Box Shadow
box-shadow: 0 4px 20px #92705240;Gradient
background: linear-gradient(135deg, #927052, #c49e7f);Tailwind-style
--color-wood-brown: #927052;Tailwind CSS Utilities
Use arbitrary value syntax in Tailwind CSS to apply Wood Brown without a custom config.
Background
bg-[#927052]Text
text-[#927052]Border
border-[#927052]Ring
ring-[#927052]Fill
fill-[#927052]From (gradient)
from-[#927052]Via (gradient)
via-[#927052]To (gradient)
to-[#927052]Design Tokens
Ready-to-use Wood Brown design token in CSS custom properties, SCSS, Tailwind v3/v4, and JSON formats.
CSS Custom Properties
:root {
--color-wood-brown: #927052;
--color-wood-brown-rgb: 146, 112, 82;
--color-wood-brown-hsl: 28, 28%, 45%;
}SCSS Variables
$color-wood-brown: #927052; $color-wood-brown-rgb: 146, 112, 82; $color-wood-brown-hsl: 28, 28%, 45%;
Tailwind v3 Config
// tailwind.config.js
module.exports = {
theme: {
extend: {
colors: {
'wood-brown': '#927052',
},
},
},
};Tailwind v4 (@theme)
/* tailwind.css */
@theme {
--color-wood-brown: #927052;
}JSON Design Token (W3C format)
{
"wood-brown": {
"value": "#927052",
"type": "color",
"description": "Wood Brown — #927052"
}
}More brown colors
View all →What Does Wood Brown Mean? Color Psychology & Cultural Symbolism
The design power of Wood Brown lies in its material authenticity. At #927052, this medium tone communicates stability in the way only earthy, natural colors can—without spectacle, just presence.
- Brown carries the associations of the earth, wood, leather, and the materials of pre-industrial life—a grounding quality that contemporary branding leverages for authenticity, craft, and natural origin. Its associations with coffee, chocolate, and wood make it an instinctive choice for artisanal food and lifestyle brands.
- Across Asian cultures, brown tones—particularly warm earthy reds and ochres—appear extensively in traditional architecture, ceramics, and clothing. Earth tones are universally associated with stability and natural order, and brown occupies this role across most of the world's cultural traditions.
- Wood Brown's medium lightness (45%) shifts its psychological register: a balanced mid-tone that embodies earthiness, stability, warmth, and authenticity at its most direct.
- At 28% saturation, Wood Brown reads as muted—Muted taupes and pale warms are some of design's most universally usable neutrals—background-perfect, unthreatening, and inherently warm without competing with other palette elements.
The brands that use Wood Brown well are the ones that understand that authenticity can't be faked—it can only be matched by colors that embody it.
How to Use Wood Brown in Design: Applications, Pairings & Best Practices
Brands reaching for authenticity and craft frequently choose Wood Brown over other options precisely because it doesn't try to be clever. It simply is what it is—warm, honest, and materially grounded.
- UI components: warm accent colors, earthy neutral backgrounds, natural brand accents—Wood Brown performs reliably in all these roles with its medium tonal character.
- Brand & identity: coffee and chocolate brands, craft beer packaging, outdoor gear—contexts where Wood Brown's muted quality creates the right register.
- Typography: Wood Brown as text requires a dark background; its 45% lightness means it provides 4.5:1 contrast on white, meeting WCAG AA.
- Wood Brown creates strong legibility with black text overlays (4.7:1 contrast ratio), making it a reliable background or surface color in design systems
- Proportional use: Wood Brown's muted quality means it scales well across proportions—from full-bleed backgrounds to single-pixel borders—making it an unusually versatile palette component.
The brands that use Wood Brown well are the ones that understand that authenticity can't be faked—it can only be matched by colors that embody it.
Wood Brown Accessibility: WCAG Contrast Ratios, Color Blindness & Inclusive Design
Wood Brown (#927052) reaches 4.66:1 contrast with black text—meeting WCAG 2.1 AA minimum of 4.5:1 for normal text and 3:1 for large text. It clears standard production accessibility requirements. Relative luminance: 18.3%.
- As text on white (#FFFFFF): 4.50:1 — AA ✓
- As text on black (#000000): 4.66:1 — AA ✓
- Best text color on Wood Brown background: Black (#000000) at 4.66:1
- WCAG 2.1 luminance: 18.3% — mid-range luminance—it sits in the transition zone where both dark and light text approaches require testing against the 4.5:1 WCAG threshold
- Wood Brown qualifies for normal body text and all larger sizes (AA).
- Color blindness consideration: protanopia and deuteranopia (red-green color blindness, ~8% of males) may affect how brown-family colors are distinguished from greens and browns. For critical UI states, supplement color alone with shape, label, or pattern cues.
For production use, test Wood Brown against your specific background colors rather than assuming #FFFFFF or #000000 performance translates. Surrounding colors alter perceived contrast.
Wood Brown in Industry: Branding, Design & Market Applications
Wood Brown (#927052) is most at home in industries where earthiness, stability, warmth, and authenticity are key brand values. Its medium quality makes it particularly effective in Food & Beverage contexts, where the muted saturation signals warmth at exactly the right register.
- Food & Beverage: Brown's associations with coffee, chocolate, bread, and wood-fire cooking make it indispensable for food brands that want to project artisanal quality, warmth, and natural origin. The color does the work of suggesting handmade, slow-craft processes before a single word is read. (examples: Chipotle, Sweetgreen, Blue Bottle Coffee) Light browns work for dairy and bakery; dark browns for coffee, chocolate, and premium spirits.
- Outdoor & Lifestyle: Outdoor, hiking, and adventure brands use brown as an earth tone that grounds the product in natural environments. Combined with forest greens and slate grays, it creates a palette language of terrain, durability, and wilderness competence. (examples: Yeti, Arc'teryx, Patagonia) Brown leather and canvas associations make it particularly effective for gear, footwear, and heritage outdoor brands.
- Craft & Artisanal: The craft movement across food, beer, candles, and home goods has made brown its unofficial color—it signals hand-made, small-batch, locally-sourced, and premium-for-a-reason. Any product that wants to claim artisanal credentials benefits from earthy, brown-anchored packaging. Kraft paper brown in particular has become synonymous with sustainable, artisanal packaging.
- Brand positioning: Wood Brown is best suited for brands projecting naturalness, warmth, reliability. Categories outside this positioning—technology products—tend to see weaker results.
- Adjacent applications: Beyond primary industries, Wood Brown works effectively in artisanal food, furniture and home goods, natural product labels—contexts where warmth serves a secondary but reinforcing role.
The industries where Wood Brown performs best are those where the audience expects warmth. Build brand strategy around this alignment, not against it.
Accessibility & Design Guides
Frequently Asked Questions
- What is the hex code for Wood Brown? ▾
- The hex code for Wood Brown is #927052. Its RGB values are rgb(146, 112, 82) and its HSL values are hsl(28, 28%, 45%).
- What does Wood Brown mean in design? ▾
- Brown is the color of earth, wood, and food — the most organic color in the spectrum. It conveys honesty, dependability, and unpretentiousness. Unlike the engineered precision of black, brown's warmth feels handmade and authentic. Coffee culture has made brown aspirational in ways it never was in the 20th century; the smell and warmth of a coffee shop is inseparable from its brown palette. Darker, richer browns signal luxury craft — leather, walnut, dark chocolate. Lighter sandy browns feel outdoor, regional, and approachable. Brown's weakness is its association with dirt and decay in medical contexts, where it is largely avoided. At medium lightness, it is the most versatile tone of this hue family — readable as text on light backgrounds, yet vibrant enough as a visual accent.
- Is Wood Brown WCAG accessible? ▾
- Wood Brown (#927052) passes WCAG AA on white with a 4.5:1 contrast ratio. Its overall accessibility score is 54/100.
- What colors go well with Wood Brown? ▾
- Wood Brown pairs well with its complementary color Alice Blue (#F0F8FF). Analogous colors like Red and Burnt Sienna also work harmoniously. Check the Color Harmonies section above for the full palette.
- What is Wood Brown used for? ▾
- Wood Brown is commonly used for: Coffee shops and specialty beverage brands; Chocolate and premium confectionery; Outdoor gear and hiking equipment; Furniture and home furnishing brands; Craft beer and artisanal food products.
- What are the CSS and Tailwind values for Wood Brown? ▾
- In CSS, use `color: #927052` or `background-color: #927052`. The CSS custom property is `--color-wood-brown: #927052`. In Tailwind CSS, use the arbitrary value class `bg-[#927052]` for backgrounds or `text-[#927052]` for text.