RAL Design System plus — hue 140

Unlike 120 and 130, this hue continues down to L\* 20. The darkest shades, 140 20 05 (Melanite black green) and 140 20 10 (Mountain range green), sit at an LRV of just over six and read as black from a distance. That is the classic area of painted exterior joinery: frames, doors, shutters, fencing. RAL 6009 fir green and RAL 6003 olive green lie close by and explain why this is familiar green for many clients.

What makes such a dark shade preferable to black is that it turns out to have colour as soon as you come closer. A black frame stays black; a frame in 140 20 10 reads as dark from the street and as green in the doorway. That difference costs nothing and delivers the detail that exterior joinery is all about.

There is a second reason this area is much used outdoors: it is the hue of looking away. 140 60 30 (Blackthorn green), 140 70 10 (Wormwood green) and 140 80 05 (Willow green) are the colours of scrub, willow and dried reed, and an object in those colours takes up less room in a green setting than its dimensions suggest. For technical cabinets, fencing, masts and installations in the countryside that is the reason to look here — not to find the colour attractive, but to make the object disappear.

All 48 colours in this group

RAL 140 20 05 — Melanite black greenView RAL 140 20 05 →RAL 140 20 10 — Mountain range greenView RAL 140 20 10 →RAL 140 20 20 — Bavarian greenView RAL 140 20 20 →RAL 140 30 05 — Black Forest greenView RAL 140 30 05 →RAL 140 30 10 — Copper pyrite greenView RAL 140 30 10 →RAL 140 30 20 — Nettle greenView RAL 140 30 20 →RAL 140 30 30 — Chestnut greenView RAL 140 30 30 →RAL 140 30 40 — Ranger greenView RAL 140 30 40 →RAL 140 40 05 — Stone greenView RAL 140 40 05 →RAL 140 40 10 — Loden greenView RAL 140 40 10 →RAL 140 40 20 — Acacia greenView RAL 140 40 20 →RAL 140 40 30 — Peacock greenView RAL 140 40 30 →RAL 140 40 40 — Radical greenView RAL 140 40 40 →RAL 140 40 50 — Brazilian greenView RAL 140 40 50 →RAL 140 50 05 — Silver maple greenView RAL 140 50 05 →RAL 140 50 10 — Fir spruce greenView RAL 140 50 10 →RAL 140 50 20 — Silver willow greenView RAL 140 50 20 →RAL 140 50 30 — Rambling greenView RAL 140 50 30 →RAL 140 50 40 — Guinean greenView RAL 140 50 40 →RAL 140 50 50 — Mountain meadow greenView RAL 140 50 50 →RAL 140 50 60 — Temperamental greenView RAL 140 50 60 →RAL 140 60 05 — Camouflage greenView RAL 140 60 05 →RAL 140 60 10 — Silver linden greyView RAL 140 60 10 →RAL 140 60 20 — Spinach greenView RAL 140 60 20 →RAL 140 60 30 — Blackthorn greenView RAL 140 60 30 →RAL 140 60 40 — Fresh greenView RAL 140 60 40 →RAL 140 60 50 — Parsley greenView RAL 140 60 50 →RAL 140 60 60 — Oregano greenView RAL 140 60 60 →RAL 140 60 70 — Balloon greenView RAL 140 60 70 →RAL 140 70 05 — Ginkgo greenView RAL 140 70 05 →RAL 140 70 10 — Wormwood greenView RAL 140 70 10 →RAL 140 70 20 — Dew greenView RAL 140 70 20 →RAL 140 70 30 — Aniseed leaf greenView RAL 140 70 30 →RAL 140 70 40 — Sour greenView RAL 140 70 40 →RAL 140 70 50 — Acid greenView RAL 140 70 50 →RAL 140 70 60 — Drop greenView RAL 140 70 60 →RAL 140 80 05 — Willow greenView RAL 140 80 05 →RAL 140 80 10 — Pastel grey greenView RAL 140 80 10 →RAL 140 80 20 — Gio Ponti greenView RAL 140 80 20 →RAL 140 80 30 — Relaxation greenView RAL 140 80 30 →RAL 140 80 40 — Dentist greenView RAL 140 80 40 →RAL 140 85 05 — Deadnettle whiteView RAL 140 85 05 →RAL 140 85 10 — Leek whiteView RAL 140 85 10 →RAL 140 85 20 — Limestone slateView RAL 140 85 20 →RAL 140 85 30 — Mint cocktail greenView RAL 140 85 30 →RAL 140 90 05 — Rosemary whiteView RAL 140 90 05 →RAL 140 90 10 — Touch of greenView RAL 140 90 10 →RAL 140 93 05 — Chestnut whiteView RAL 140 93 05 →

More about hue 140

The muted shades do that better than the saturated ones. 140 60 70 (Balloon green), at saturation 70 the strongest of the hue, does exactly the opposite: it stands out in a green setting, because living green is never that saturated.

In exterior use, lightfastness is the point on which a colour choice stands or falls. In practice, dark, strongly saturated greens are built up from several pigments, and those pigments do not weather at the same rate. If one shifts faster than the other, not only the lightness changes but the colour direction as well: the green pulls towards blue-green or towards grey, depending on which pigment gives up first.

That has two consequences. For new build, prefer a shade in this hue that does not draw its intensity entirely from saturation, so that a shift is less visible. When touching up existing work, do not compare with the original code but measure the current state: a green fifteen years old is no longer the colour that was in the specification, and a new surface in the old code will stand out as a deviation.

With an average hue angle of 148 degrees, 140 lies clearly in the cool half — further from the warmth peak at around 50 degrees than any hue in this part of the circle, and still well before the coolness maximum at around 230 degrees. The trace of yellow keeps the colour from turning chilly. In interiors that means: a green from this hue cools a space without becoming aloof, and the dark shades give a space weight without closing it in.

Green is the area in which the eye sees the smallest differences, and in the dark shades of this hue that cannot be followed on a screen — there two neighbouring shades merge into near-black. Assess dark greens in daylight, at a large size and at the gloss level of the final situation, because with dark colours gloss changes the perceived lightness more than with light ones. For approval, work with the A4 colour samples as the colour standard, never with a fan-deck sample.

Technical data

Hue: 140 · Shades: 48 · Lightness: L\* 20–93 · Saturation: C\* 05–70 · Lab values: per shade on the colour page · LRV: 6.3 to 83.7 · Included in: RAL D4 A4 colour samples (colour standard), RAL D2 fan deck, RAL D3 colour book, RAL D4 atlas, RAL D6 and D8 boxes

Neighbouring hues

RAL Design 130, RAL Design 150

Loose colour samples from this group

Click a colour for the available formats, or see the full product range in the shop.

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