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Chartreuse (English pronunciation: /ʃɑːˈtrɜːz/ or US: /ʃɑrˈtruːz/ or /ʃɑrˈtruːs/;^[1] French pronunciation: [ʃaʁtʁøz]) (the web color) is a color halfway between yellow and green that was named because of its resemblance to the green color of one of the French liqueurs called green chartreuse, introduced in 1764; whereas chartreuse (the traditional color) is a yellow color mixed with a small amount of green that was named because of its resemblance to the yellow color of one of the French liqueurs called yellow chartreuse, introduced in 1838.^[2]

Chartreuse (web color) (chartreuse green)

Chartreuse (web color)
— Color coordinates —
Hex triplet		#7FFF00
RGBB	(r, g, b)	(127, 255, 0)
HSV	(h, s, v)	(90°, 100%, 100%)
Source		X11
B: Normalized to [0–255] (byte)

At right is displayed the web color chartreuse.

The term chartreuse was first used to refer to "a pale apple-green" in 1884.^[3] This was codified when the X11 web colors were invented in the mid-1990s. The web color chartreuse is the color precisely halfway between green and yellow, so it is 50% green and 50% yellow. It is one of the tertiary colors of the HSV color wheel, also known as the RGB color wheel.

Chartreuse (traditional) (chartreuse yellow)

Chartreuse (traditional)
— Color coordinates —
Hex triplet		#DFFF00
RGBB	(r, g, b)	(223, 255, 0)
Source		unsourced
B: Normalized to [0–255] (byte)

The color names chartreuse and chartreuse yellow traditionally refer to much more yellowish colors than the web color chartreuse.

The first recorded use of chartreuse to mean the color that is now called chartreuse yellow in English was in 1892.^[4]

Variations of chartreuse

Pear

Pear
— Color coordinates —
Hex triplet		#D1E231
RGBB	(r, g, b)	(209, 226, 49)
HSV	(h, s, v)	(66°, 78%, 88[5]%)
Source		[Unsourced]
B: Normalized to [0–255] (byte)

Pear

Pear is a desaturated chartreuse yellow that resembles the color of Anjou or Bartlett pears.

The color pear is used to advertise cans or bottles of pear nectar.

Green-yellow

Green-Yellow
— Color coordinates —
Hex triplet		#ADFF2F
RGBB	(r, g, b)	(173, 255, 47)
HSV	(h, s, v)	(84°, 100%, 67%)
Source		X11[6]
B: Normalized to [0–255] (byte)

Displayed at right is the web color green-yellow, a light tint of chartreuse.

Lawn green

Lawn Green
— Color coordinates —
Hex triplet		#7CFC00
RGBB	(r, g, b)	(124, 252, 0)
HSV	(h, s, v)	(90°, 98%, 48%)
Source		X11
B: Normalized to [0–255] (byte)

Displayed at right is the web color lawn green, a bright tint of chartreuse.

Pistachio

Pistachio
— Color coordinates —
Hex triplet		#93C572
RGBB	(r, g, b)	(147, 197, 114)
HSV	(h, s, v)	(96°, 42%, 77[7]%)
Source		ISCC-NBS
B: Normalized to [0–255] (byte)

Displayed at right is the color pistachio, also called pistachio green, a representation of the color of the interior meat of a pistachio nut. It is also a representation of the color of pistachio ice cream (one of the flavors of ice cream in spumoni), and of pistachio pudding.

The first recorded use of pistachio green as a color name in English was in 1789.^[8]

Source of color: ISCC-NBS Dictionary of Color Names (1955)--Color Sample of Pistachio Green (Color Sample #135).

Yellow-green

Yellow-Green
— Color coordinates —
Hex triplet		#9ACD32
RGBB	(r, g, b)	(154, 205, 50)
HSV	(h, s, v)	(90°, 60%, 54%)
Source		X11
B: Normalized to [0–255] (byte)

Displayed at right is the web color yellow-green, a dull medium shade of chartreuse.

Before the X11 web colors were invented in the mid-1990s, the color term yellow-green was used to refer to the color that is now designated as the web color chartreuse (chartreuse green) (i.e., the color halfway between yellow and green on the color wheel), shown above. Now, the term yellow-green is used to refer to this medium desaturated shade of chartreuse.

Apple green

Apple Green
— Color coordinates —
Hex triplet		#8DB600
RGBB	(r, g, b)	(141, 182, 0)
HSV	(h, s, v)	(74°, 100%, 71[9]%)
Source		ISCC-NBS
B: Normalized to [0–255] (byte)

Displayed at right is the color apple green, a representation of the color of the outer skin of a green apple.

The first recorded use of apple green as a color name in English was in 1648.^[10]

Source of color: ISCC-NBS Dictionary of Color Names (1955)--Color Sample of Apple Green (Color Sample #115).

Olive

Olive
— Color coordinates —
Hex triplet		#808000
RGBB	(r, g, b)	(128, 128, 0)
HSV	(h, s, v)	(60°, 100%, 50%)
Source		X11 color names
B: Normalized to [0–255] (byte)

Olive is a dark shade of yellow typically seen on green olives. It can be formed by adding a little black to yellow dye or paint. As a color word in the English language, it is unexpectedly old, appearing in late Middle English. Shaded green, it becomes olive drab. Olive can also be referred to as dark yellow. That the color olive is a shade of yellow can readily be ascertained by inspecting its hex code—the red and green values are equal, with no blue value, signifying a shade of yellow.

Sometimes people of what in the early 20th century was called the Mediterranean subrace of the Caucasian race are described as being "olive-skinned", to denote shades of medium toned white skin that is darker than the average color for Caucasians, such as many people from southern Italy. In religion, olive is sometimes used as a Church color during Ordinary Time. Shades of olive, such as Olive Drab, are frequently used for camouflage, or by the military in general. The complementary color of olive is lavender.

Green olives

Olive drab

Olive Drab
— Color coordinates —
Hex triplet		#6B8E23
RGBB	(r, g, b)	(107, 142, 35)
HSV	(h, s, v)	(80°, 75%, 56%)
Source		X11 color names
B: Normalized to [0–255] (byte)

Olive drab is the color olive shaded toward a greener color.

The first recorded use of olive drab as a color name in English was in 1892.^[11]

Olive drab was the color of the standard fighting uniform for U.S. GIs and military vehicles during World War II. U.S. soldiers often referred to their uniforms as "OD's" due to the color. The color used at the beginning of the war by the US Army was officially called Olive Drab #3, which was replaced by the darker Olive Drab #7 by 1944, and which was again replaced by Olive Green 107 or OG-107 sometime in the 1950s and continued as the official uniform color for combat fatigues through the Vietnam War, until replaced by ERDL camouflage uniforms. The ERDL uniforms were then replaced by M81 woodland camo fatigues as the primary US uniform scheme in the 1980s, and still retain olive drab as one of the color swatches in the pattern.

As a solid color, it is not as effective for camouflage as multiple-color camo schemes (i.e. US Army Combat Uniform, tigerstripe, MARPAT, Multicam, etc.), though it is still used by the U.S. military to color webbing and accessories. The military refers to the color as Olive Green 107, or more commonly OG 107.^[12] There are very few countries still issuing uni-color Olive Drab uniforms, Israel, India, Cuba, and Austria being the exceptions.

The color is currently defined by the FS-595 paint standard.^[13][14]

Camouflage green

Camouflage green
— Color coordinates —
Hex triplet		#78866B
RGBB	(r, g, b)	(120, 134, 107)
HSV	(h, s, v)	(91°, 20%, 53%)
Source		[Unsourced]
B: Normalized to [0–255] (byte)

Camouflage green is a color that resembles the gray-green color often used by the military and hunters to camouflage themselves. Thus, this color is often known as military green and is related to hunter green.

Camouflage green is used in camouflage.

Dark olive green

Dark Olive Green
— Color coordinates —
Hex triplet		#556B2F
RGBB	(r, g, b)	(85, 107, 47)
HSV	(h, s, v)	(82°, 56%, 42[15]%)
Source		X11
B: Normalized to [0–255] (byte)

Displayed at right is the web color color dark olive green.

Chartreuse in popular culture

Note: Any of these references to the color chartreuse made in artistic creations produced before the mid 1990s refer to the traditional color chartreuse (chartreuse yellow). Works produced since the mid 1990s may be referring to either the traditional color chartreuse (chartreuse yellow) or the web color chartreuse (chartreuse green), depending on the context.

Alcoholic beverages

• Chartreuse (web color) (chartreuse green) represents green chartreuse liqueur; Chartreuse (traditional) (chartreuse yellow) represents yellow chartreuse liqueur.^[2]

Art

• Since the mid 1960s, water based fluorescent chartreuse (traditional) (chartreuse yellow) colored paint has been available to paint psychedelic black light paintings. (Fluorescent chartreuse yellow is one of the seven major colors used, in addition to fluorescent orange, fluorescent red, fluorescent cerise, fluorescent magenta, fluorescent "blue" (actually azure), and fluorescent green.)
• In Modesto, California, there is a gallery and art school known as the Chartreuse Muse.

Automobiles

• The Volkswagen Type 2 Transporter Westfalia model was well known for mostly being produced in the chartreuse color. The vehicle is referenced in the song "Convoy" (see below).

Electronics

• It was announced over the radio in the early 1990s as part of a trivia clip that the third color that can be emitted by a red/green bi-color LED is officially known as chartreuse.^{[citation needed]} The third color is now more correctly referred to as amber. This was a mistake most likely due to the fact that the Crayola crayon company incorrectly labeled an amber-like color in 1972 as being chartreuse; this color was in 1990 re-labeled Atomic Tangerine.
• The early green LEDs are now sometimes called chartreuse to distinguish them from more-modern, deeper-green LEDs.^[16]

Film

• Chartreuse green is the color of the Autobot medic Ratchet in the live action 2007 Transformers film.^[17]
• The 1960 Universal film Chartroose Caboose featured a "bright green" colored train car.^[18]

Firefighting

• Since about 1973, a sort of fluorescent chartreuse (traditional) (chartreuse yellow) color has been adopted as the color of fire engines in parts of the United States and elsewhere. The reason behind this is that chartreuse fire engines are more visible on the streets than the traditional red fire engines, especially at night (the reason for this is the Purkinje Effect, i.e., the cones do not function as efficiently in dim light, so red objects appear to be black). In Australia and New Zealand this form of chartreuse yellow is also known as "ACT Yellow" as this is the color of the fire engines in the Australian Capital Territory.

Music

• In "Convoy", a 1975 song by C.W. McCall, "11 long-haired friends of Jesus" were said to have taken part in the eponymous convoy in a "...chartreuse microbus".
• In the song 50/50, on the album "Overnite Sensation" by Frank Zappa: "Well my teeth are all loose/and my breath is chartreuse".
• In Kimya Dawson's song "Wandering Daughter", she says: "Go out for ceruleans, come home with chartreuses/Snip and cut bonsais, and turn them to spruces".
• The song "You Dyed Your Hair Chartreuse," recorded by Louis Jordan and His Tympani Five, is directed at a girl who has "spent too much time in that beauty booth" and whose hair has turned chartreuse.

Religion

• The Grande Chartreuse is a Catholic monastery in the Chartreuse mountains and the mother house of the Carthusian monks; it is the origin of Chartreuse liqueur, after which both yellow and green chartreuse colors are named.

Restaurants

• The Chartroose Caboose is a restaurant in Kansas City, Missouri that specializes in Philadelphia steak sandwiches.^[19]

Safety Clothing

• Public utility workers in most cities wear clothing colored fluorescent traditional chartreuse (i.e., fluorescent chartreuse yellow) (officially called neon yellow) for safety purposes when working on the street. This color is also worn by bicyclists for safety purposes.

Sport

• Fluorescent chartreuse (traditional) (chartreuse yellow) is sometimes used for tennis balls to make them easier to see when playing tennis.
• Chartreuse (traditional) (chartreuse yellow) is one of the official colors of the Phoenix Mercury of the Women's National Basketball Association.
• Chartreuse (both the traditional and web colors) is one of the most often used colors on fishing lures, especially for saltwater lures on the Atlantic and Gulf Coasts. In fishing the term chartreuse can vary between more yellowish and more green. Chartreuse is a popular color on lures for the inshore saltwater game fish speckled trout (a.k.a. spotted sea trout).

Television

• In the television show The Angry Beavers, Norbert's girlfriend Treeflower fronts for a band called The Friendly Chartreuse Bubble Gum Machine.
• In an episode of Goof Troop, Pete attempts to use Goofy's cat for his own purposes, and so tells Goofy that the cat is allergic to the paint on his house—in fact, that the cat is allergic to every color but chartreuse, and "Who wants a chartreuse house?" Goofy immediately begins to paint his house the color.
• In the television show Private Practice, Cooper Freedman admits that charteuse is his favorite color because he likes the sound of the word.
• Make Mine Chartreuse, which appeared in 1987, was one of the Shades of Love made for TV movies that appeared on Canadian TV in the 1980s.

Traffic

• Chartreuse (traditional) (sometimes fluorescent) has been used in several cities, including Spokane, Washington, for school zone signs.

Vexillology

• When Bharatpur was a princely state, it was the only political entity ever to have a traditional chartreuse (chartreuse yellow) colored flag.^[20]

Video games

• The Chartreuse Hall is a hydroponics section in the game No One Lives Forever, in the Low Earth Orbit mission.^[21]

See also

• Lime
• List of colors

References

External links

• Chartreuse Trivia
• Website for the Chartreuse Muse