Oxblood
- HEX
- #4A0000
- RGB
- 74 0 0
- HSL
- 0° 100% 15%
- CMYK
- 0 100 100 71
Oxblood or Burgundy?
Darker than burgundy, a nearly black red.
Art
Chinese potters called it Lang kiln red; Europeans called it sang de boeuf, oxblood. This copper-red glaze was developed around 1705 to 1712, under the Kangxi emperor, to revive a lost Ming red. Copper only turns red in a kiln starved of oxygen, the same trick that turns celadon green, and the results were so unpredictable that Western potters spent decades trying to copy it.
Culture
On 1 April 1960 Dr. Martens launched its 1460 boot in cherry red, a deep oxblood. Skinheads took it up in the late 1960s, then punks in the 1970s.
Kin
- Celadon: China's other great glaze; both need a kiln starved of oxygen
- Brick: Kiln chemistry again: oxygen decides fired clay's color
- Burgundy: Two near-black reds, one named for wine and one for blood
Sources
- Wikipedia, 'Sang de boeuf glaze'
- Wikipedia, 'Dr. Martens' (1460 boot, 1 April 1960)
Hex values are screen approximations. Every page lists its sources.