The colors of Saint Patrick’s Day are not necessarily the same as Saint Patrick’s colors. While mentioning the patron saint of Ireland everybody starts thinking green, things are a bit more complicated. This article will explain the role of the colors of this popular feast, with some history behind it, and, for a more scientific approach we’ll also add HEX and RGB codes for all the presented colors.
St. Patrick’s Flag Color Codes
The official flag of Saint Patrick has no green color at all. It’s a simple flag with a red cross on a white background. St. Patrick’s Cross, also known as St. Patrick’s Saltire was adopted at the end of the 19th century by the Anglo-Irish Order of Saint Patrick. It is supposed to have roots in one of the powerful Irish dynasties but there are no convincing proofs for that claim. The Order was established by British King George III and Irish nationalists rejected it.
Here it is.
Codes for the colors are:
Red: #C7042C (199, 4, 44) and White: #FFFFFF (255, 255, 255)
St. Patrick’s Color
St. Patrick’s color was blue, not green. There are several candidates for the specific shade of blue, with the sash of the Order of St. Patrick, arms of the Kingdom of Ireland, and Irish presidential standard as the main contenders. Others have their own ideas of St. Patrick’s Blue.
#7696AB (118, 150, 171) St. Patrick’s Order Sash
#285AA1 (40, 90, 161) Kingdom of Ireland Arms Blue
#00005C (0, 0, 96) Irish Presidential Standard Blue
#23297A (35, 41, 122) St. Patrick’s Blue (Encycolorpedia)
#94C4E1 (148, 196, 225) Patrick’s Perfect Day (Valspar)
Irish Flag Colors
The Irish flag consists of three colors: green, white, and orange. We already have a code for white and here are the codes for green and orange:
Green: #009A49 (0, 154, 7) and Orange: #FF7900 (255,121,0)
The problem with green is that almost everybody has his intimate vision of the right shade of green. The green hue above is made by Pantone, by the way. Orange is even more controversial. Some people believe it should be gold (coming from the golden harp which was used in the Irish flag before 1916), not orange, so a stripe in the yellow shade would be way better.
Something like Golden Yellow: #FFD700 (255, 215, 0) on the left or Irish Linen (Berger) #F8F3DA (248, 243, 218) on the right in the picture above. Harp is still a national instrument of Ireland and a must at celebrations in honor of its patron saint.
While green in the flag is symbolizing the Catholic majority in Ireland, orange represents Protestants, supporters of William of Orange from the Netherlands. White between both other colors should show the peaceful coexistence of both religions in Ireland. With time, green became a symbol of Irish Nationalists and Orange a symbol of British Unionists. But let’s leave politics to politicians and check the possible shades of green, useful for all kinds of projects related to the celebration of St. Patrick’s Day.
Irish Green
What can look more Irish than the Irish Green color? We can certainly expect more than one solution when we look for the RGB code of this particular shade of green. As expected, due to the lack of unique standards, everybody with a bit of authority has a different perception:
#45BE76 (69, 190, 118) Pantone 15-6340 TCX
#40C575 (64, 197, 117) Pantone 15-6340 TPX
#179A64 (23, 154, 100) Color-name
#019529 (1, 149, 41) ArtyClick
#009E60 (0, 158, 96) Colorx
Yes, it’s hard to spot the difference between both Pantone’s Irish Green colors yet here we are. On the other hand, we can see that the major brands of paints made even more options for the market. So can you tell now what color is Irish Green?
#23824D (35, 130, 77) Sherwin-Williams
#4D922C (77, 146, 44) Dulux
#47923F (71, 146, 63) Nerolac
#08A04B (8, 160, 75) Taubmans
#589738 (88, 151, 56) Devoe Paint
In other words, we already have 15 different shades of official paint with Irish Green as an official name but still don’t know what is Irish Green…
#519033 (81, 144, 55) ICI Paints
#00985A (0, 152, 90) Gildan
#289751 (40, 151, 81) Muralo
#51952C (81, 149, 44) Glidden
#2B3D34 (43, 61, 52) Volkswagen
Ireland is an island (hence the name) which is due to its beauty often called Emerald Island. This means that one of the popular colors for St. Patrick’s Day would probably be Emerald Green. It seems we have more than one option with that name too.
Emerald Green
#50C878 (80,200,120) Color-hex
#046307 (4, 99, 7) iColorpalette
#009B77 (0, 155, 119) Colorcodes
#386938 (56, 105, 56) RAL
#086522 (8, 101, 34) Krylon
If you need just one, let me give you a hint – major brands, like Adobe, prefer the first one: #50C878. On the other hand, each one of us prefers specific authorities on specific subjects. The car industry, for instance, has its very own logic. All the next five shades of Emerald Green are made by Chrysler and all bear the same name.
Emerald Green by Chrysler
#72B2B2 (114, 178, 178)
#4F6F78 (79, 111, 120)
#507C76 (80, 124, 118)
#3F6D70 (63, 109, 112)
#193236 (25, 50, 54)
They look similar yet they difer. Other manufacturers have even more ideas for Emerald Green.
#284D3E (40, 77, 62) Houzz
#003208 (0, 50, 8) Geely
#479F71 (71, 159, 113) PPG Pittsburgh Paints
#316834 (49, 104, 52) Rust-Oleum
#1A3137 (26, 49, 55) Volkswagen
As we already expected different shades of green qualify as Emerald green which is logical because emeralds also don’t always look the same. The composition of their crystal structure with always present impurities will always offer a wide variety of hues even before the grinding.
Then, of course, the color changes even more, depending on the point of view.
Kelly Green
Kelly is a popular Irish name. It can mean many things, icluding warrior, the-one-who-frequently-goes-to-church, bright headed, and wood. It’s used as first name and surname and you can name Kelly a boy or a girl. Kelly is one of the words that are most closely associated with Ireland. Kelly Green is a popular color and it’s time to find out why it’s so special.
#4CBB17 (76, 187, 23) Canva
#339C5E (51, 156, 94) Pantone
#238A64 (35, 138, 100) FolkArt
#046A38 (4,106,56) Colorcodes
#00C957 (00C957) Crayola
Now is also a perfect opportunity to compare Kelly Green to Irish Green. The first impression is probably brightness.
09 kelly-green-color what-color-is-kelly-green-color
00644C (0, 100, 76) ICI Paints
238926 (35, 137, 38) Canada Hardware
008B51 (0, 139, 81) Avery Dennison
176B37 (23, 107, 55) IFS Coatings
8CC277 (140, 194, 119) Sico
We have more of Kelly Green in different shades.
#2DA06E (45, 160, 110) Valspar
#30884F (48, 136, 79) Color Your World
#479F71 (71, 159, 113) PPG Pittsburgh Paints
#205E41 (32, 94, 65) Martin Senour Paints
#238926 (35, 137, 38) Home Hardware
St. Patrick’s Green
Several hues of green were declared as St. Patrick’s Green. Here are a few examples.
#009B69 (0, 155, 105) St. Patrick (Dutch Boy)
#009F7E (0, 159, 126) St. Patrick (Benjamin Moore)
#50C9AC (80, 201, 172) St. Patty’s Day (Benjamin Moore)
#3A8B57 (58, 139, 87) Patrick Green (Duron)
#8CBE49 (140, 190, 73) Patrick (Ameritone Devoe)
Shamrock Green
Shamrock is the national plant of Ireland and one of the most recognized symbols of St. Patrick’s Day. If you plan anything related to the feast of this popular saint, Shamrock Green is almost a mandatory part of your color palette.
But what are the RGB codes of Shamrock Green? Don’t worry, we’ll offer a few examples from this area as well.
#097962 (9, 121, 98) Shamrock Green (Kelly-Moore)
#4EA77E (78, 167, 126) Shamrock Green (Behr)
#216D56 (33, 109, 86) Shamrock Green (Coronado Paint)
#007057 (0, 112, 87) Shamrock Green (Vista Paint)
#307962 (48, 121, 98) Shamrock Green (Cloverdale Paint)
#33CC99 (51, 204, 153) Shamrock (Crayola)
#5FA778 (95, 167, 120) Shiny Shamrock (Encycolorpedia)
#6D6B51 (109, 107, 81) Green Shamrock (Pascol)
#005029 (0, 80, 41) Shamrock (Duron)
#336D3C (51, 109, 60) Shamrock (CIL)
Still not enough? Here are even more ideas for green shades useful for Saint Paddy’s Day.
#006C2E (0, 108, 46) Ireland Green (RAL)
#3E896F (62, 137, 111) Irish Pub Green (Matthews Paint)
#87DBC7 (135, 219, 199) Irish Isle (Berger)
#0DC1A9 (13, 193, 169) Pride of Ireland (Ace)
#186C58 (24, 108, 88) Irish Dance (Frenchic Paint)
Benjamin Moore has a whole family of green paints related to Ireland:
#237B54 (35, 123, 84) Irish Clover (Benjamin Moore)
#46926D (70, 146, 109) Luck of the Irish (Benjamin Moore)
#DFF4E9 (223, 244, 233) Irish Spring (Benjamin Moore)
#357f51 (53, 127, 81) Irish Moss (Benjamin Moore)
#DEF4ED (222, 244, 237) Irish Mint (Benjamin Moore)
That’s it. Enjoy Your celebration of St. Patrick’s Feast and don’t forget to share this article with everybody who might be interested.