Colour Name Confusion

[imbrius]

I'm slightly confused by some colour names I've seen for non-tartan items, specifically hose, waistcoats, and jackets.

I've seen modern red, tartan red, burgundy, and claret; modern blue, ancient blue, lovat blue, and navy; hunting green, lovat green, and ancient green. I've seen bison, fawn, oatmeal, and grey.

Which of these are just different names for the same colours and which are actually colours? This happened because a fellow kilt-wearer noted that one of my tweed jackets was an "ancient blue", not a "lovat blue" as I'd been saying based on the advert from which I bought it. To complicate things, my wife, an art historian, noted that it was not blue at all, but a "tint of slate".

[Father Bill]

You're running into a lot of different things here, I think, and I'll be glad both to read the discussion and to help kick it off. Personally I'm 'red-green' deficient, which is the most common form of colour blindness - men who can see all colours but not finer shades on the red-green scale. For me, traffic lights are red, yellow, and white. No problem - at least they're different colours.

Some of these words are marketing ploys, but some really do have a meaning in recent Scottish Highlandwear sales. Some of the same colour (at least to me) have different names from different dealers. Some of the colour differences we see are due to computer monitors having their own inherent biases. What looks like one colour on my screen may not look quite the same to you. Blues and yellows are, I'm told, the most accurate - something that doesn't help me much with my red-green problem.

So on to those who are more knowledgeable than myself, and I hope to learn along with you.

P.S. - not too far from you, I'm told, is a wonderful lady who knits kilt hose to order - requiring a few threads from the actual cloth your tartan is made from. She matches the colours to those threads when she dyes her wool and then knits the hose. I have three pair from her and they are superb. Also not cheap! I purchased through dealers, so I'm only told by them that she's in Wisconsin or thereabouts.

[imbrius]

P.S. - not too far from you, I'm told, is a wonderful lady who knits kilt hose to order - requiring a few threads from the actual cloth your tartan is made from. She matches the colours to those threads when she dyes her wool and then knits the hose. I have three pair from her and they are superb. Also not cheap! I purchased through dealers, so I'm only told by them that she's in Wisconsin or thereabouts.

I believe that I have heard of her. For me, that's a someday thing. I would love for her to knit me some hose. First I have to decide if the five-yard in Armstrong Ancient I'm currently wearing will be my formal kilt for good. I'm thinking that someday I will want an 8-yard from USA Kilts but I'm not sure what tartan (Armstrong Ancient? I love it but if so, then what do I do with the five-yard from Higgins? Guthrie? But that's not my primary clan affiliation. Armstrong Modern? But all my other stuff is geared toward ancient colours, Freemason Universal? But I have a clan society membership... etc.) so I think I'll hold off on bespoke hose for now. But thanks!!

[Father Bill]

I think I'll hold off on bespoke hose for now. But thanks!!

Don't wait too long; she announced her retirement once and then put it off.

[figheadair]

This subject is a bit of a minefield and one that is complicated by the use of the term colour when shade, tone or hue is actually what is being referred to.

Red, blue, green etc., are colours; Ancient Blue, Modern Green etc., are shades/tones/hues. Bison is a trade name for a brown shade but I'm not sure that there is a definitive RGB value. There is a particular difficulty with Burgundy, Claret, Maroon, Rust, Magenta etc., all of which seem to be used indiscriminately for various shades of red.

Not much help in answering the OP but shows the difficulty in trying to determine the exact shade of a colour from a description.