Tech Brands Color Hub

Navy pinstripe suiting separates fine light threads on a dark ground, so the cloth reads as a solid colour until it is seen close up, and this palette is shirt white with stripe pale. It feels sharp and formal, the color of a suit that means business.

A teal pinstripe reads as navy at a distance and reveals its colour only up close, which is why it works as a formal fabric, and this palette is shirt pale with suit dark. It feels subtle and tailored, the color of a suit that changes when you step closer.

A navy striped tee repeats one dark line across a pale ground, so the garment reads as a single muted colour from across a room, and this palette is tee pale with stripe light. It feels casual and classic, the color of a shirt with lines across it.

Gunmetal is an alloy of copper, tin and zinc that takes a blue-grey sheen only after it has been cast and cooled, so its colour arrives at the end of the process, and this palette is polish pale with oiled steel. It feels armoured and precise, the color of a surface that was molten an hour ago.

Corrugated metal gets its stiffness from the folds rather than the thickness of the sheet, which is why a shed can be made of something as thin as a business card, and this palette is rib pale with fold mid. It feels cheap and structural, the color of a barn that hums in the wind.

A Breton shirt has exactly twenty-one stripes by regulation, one for each of Napoleon's victories, which is almost certainly a story invented after the fact, and this palette is ground pale with dense deep. It feels nautical and dependable, the color of a shirt that belongs on a quay.

Hickory stripe is denim with pale warp stripes woven in, so a pair of overalls reads as two fabrics from across a yard and two colours from across a field, and this palette is twine pale with weft deep. It feels rugged and utilitarian, the color of a rail crew in a photograph.

The Amazon rainforest is a closed canopy of green that stretches for thousands of kilometres and holds a tenth of all known species, and this palette is canopy leaf with understory. It feels teeming and humid, the color of a green ocean with its own weather.

A caramel apple is a red apple drowned in glossy toffee, the colour somewhere between autumn and dessert, and this palette is caramel with toffee shine. It feels festive and sticky, the color of an orchard in caramel.