The Paleta blog
Practical guides and curious detours about colour — how to pick it, convert it, and use it well. Written to be read, not skimmed.
Welcome to Paleta: A Colour Studio in Your Browser
The idea behind Paleta, and a quick tour of every tool — where to start and what each one is for.
How to Choose a Colour Palette That Doesn't Look Like Everyone Else's
Pick one colour you mean, expand it with a little theory, and test it before you commit.
HEX to RGB: How Colour Conversion Actually Works
What those six characters really mean — and how to turn them into any other format.
HEX, RGB, HSL & OKLCH: Which Colour Code Should You Use?
A plain-English tour of the four formats you'll actually meet in CSS.
What Is OKLCH? The Colour Model Quietly Taking Over CSS
Why designers are switching, and what it fixes about HSL.
Colour Contrast and WCAG, Explained Without the Jargon
How to make text readable for everyone — and why the numbers matter.
What Are Design Tokens? A Colour-First Introduction
Naming your colours so a whole product can share them.
How to Pull a Colour Palette From Any Photo
Turn a sunset, a poster or a product shot into usable colours.
Colour Harmony: Complementary, Triadic and the Rest, Demystified
The colour wheel, minus the art-school mystique.
Why Screen Colours and Print Colours Never Match
The short, honest answer to the RGB-versus-CMYK headache.
A Brief, Strange History of Colour
Tyrian purple, the word 'orange', and the blackest black ever made.
The Psychology of Colour in Branding: Evidence vs Myth
What the research supports, and what's just marketing folklore.
What Colours Mean Around the World
Red, white and green don't say the same thing everywhere.
Does Colour Really Affect Your Mood?
Sorting the science from the mood-ring.
Designing for Colour Blindness: A Practical Guide
Simple habits that make your work legible to everyone.
Colour Theory Basics Every Designer Actually Uses
Hue, saturation, lightness and the wheel — the useful part of colour theory, minus the lecture.
The Colour Wheel, Actually Explained
Where it comes from, how to read it, and how to use it to pick colours that agree.
Tints, Shades and Tones: How to Build a Colour Scale
The difference between adding white, black and grey — and how to make a scale that never goes muddy.
Complementary Colours: Why Opposites Work
The loudest pairing on the wheel — how to use it without giving everyone a headache.
How to Build a Monochromatic Colour Scheme
One hue, many moods — the most foolproof palette there is.
Analogous Colours: The Easiest Palette to Get Right
Neighbours on the wheel that always seem to agree — plus the one trick to keep them from blurring.
Warm vs Cool Colours and Why It Changes Everything
The oldest distinction in colour, and how it quietly steers mood, depth and attention.
Primary, Secondary and Tertiary Colours Explained
The family tree of every colour — and why 'primary' means different things in paint and light.
What Colours Make Brown? (And How Mixing Really Works)
The internet's favourite colour question, answered properly — plus grey and every muddy in-between.
The 60-30-10 Rule for Colour That Just Works
The interior-design ratio that quietly makes interfaces look designed.
How to Make a CSS Gradient That Doesn't Look Cheap
Why most gradients look muddy in the middle — and the fixes that make them glow.
Designing a Dark-Mode Colour Palette (the Right Way)
Why 'invert everything' fails, and how to build dark colours that feel calm instead of harsh.
How to Make Pastel Colours (Without the Mud)
Soft, dreamy, and weirdly easy to get wrong — here's how to keep pastels clean.
How to Build an Accessible Colour Palette
Beautiful and readable aren't opposites — a workflow that gets you both.
RGBA, Hex Alpha and Opacity, Finally Explained
What that fourth number does, and why a transparent colour isn't the same as a lighter one.
Where to Find Colour Palette Ideas (and Make Them Yours)
Stuck at a blank canvas? Here's where good palettes actually come from.
Blue: The Story of the World's Favourite Colour
The last colour to get a name, the hardest to make, and the one almost everyone picks first.