What Colors Make Burgundy

what colors make burgundy? There are 3 ingredients needed to produce it, the primary colors red and blue, and the brown as the last one.

Have you ever wondered, at one point in time when you went shopping with your friend for a birthday gift like, let say a t-shirt and before going to a store you make some decisions on what color to pick, for example, he said: “Hey let’s choose between apple green or navy blue or maybe like burgundy”? And without knowing at first what the last color looks like, you said “uhh what is burgundy? Never seen it before”. Your friend says, “do not worry! I will show you!”. Well, I am your friend, and let me show you what color that is and what makes them into that!

Burgundy, comes from the many shades of red (like some other colors too). But before going into that section, we will go back to some basic colors in order to make them. There are 3 ingredients needed to produce it, the primary colors red and blue, and the brown as the last one.

what colors make burgundy

Though there are other ways to get burgundy, we will try to focus on this one first. But if  you are using a computer, like Adobe Photoshop, this can be achieved quite easily. Given the choices in the color palette, the hex color code would be #800020. Manually, you input the following codes in the preset: 80 for red, 00 for green and 20 for blue. Hence, the hexadecimal code of #800020. There are also some specific procedures to get that code. We are not yet done here but we will try to get the next method.

If you like to get into painting, and this one can be done through some trial and error and also with personal preferences to a degree. Let us try to use the previous requirements, with blue, red and brown.

Actually, we will use the same exact colors again to achieve different shades. First we will make brown as our base paint to make it a lot easier to handle the depth of effect we desire. Mix red and blue to get brown and after acquiring that (and this is where your preference will come into play) we mix it again with red. The brighter the red mixture, the lighter the undertone of burgundy is. The opposite effect will be displayed when using a darker red combination. And that is basically how you get the color burgundy. And there is more.

How to make burgundy

Okay we’ll try a different path what colors make burgundy. How about red, magenta (another family under pink and purple, also the result will depend on the amount mixed between the two) and black? Yes, it works! We will work out with the magenta first as the rest of the ingredients are easy. We need the primary colors blue and red to get magenta. The density of magenta may not be needed as much, as the rest of the colors will make that for you. Whichever you start the base with is okay. To proceed, we will start off with purple maybe around 20% (if you are mixing with acrylic paint, just try to estimate it with your preference) then we mix it red of about 30% and the rest is black with 50% since burgundy itself is of darker shade in its base form. You will get about a 100% result of burgundy.

what colors make burgundy

The third method we can use is by using hex colors or 42% red, 21% of blue, 2% of green and 35% of black. This is kind being technical, playing around the hexadecimals to have the same effect. More or less, this color closely resembles burgundy.

The answer is simple to this question, it is the procedures that make it interesting and on how we based it on RGB/RYB and CMYK in color theory (for another discussion). 

We will now swim to the sea of shades. From changing your hair color in a salon, buying lipstick, nail color, bags, wine, a t-shirt..you name it. The color is as versatile as it can get, and multiple names are fancier too. 

On the left side we have samples of variations of burgundy, and the depth of each can be distinguished by the shades it has. Some names may be familiar to you since a lot of it refers to what they represent. Such as jams, apples, mahogany, blood, blush, brick, cherry, ruby and many more. To other people, and maybe their country, burgundy can be or considered as a color of royalty. You heard that right, Royalty. Depending on what you believe in, colors can come in many forms and meaning.

 Getting into the shades is not tricky as it might seem, since you already have the basics of creating it. What comes next is how you play and experiment with color densities ( or the amount you put into the mixtures). Just always remember the key part is that the brighter the added component, the lighter the result is. Or the darker the other ingredient is the more solid the outcome is. Anyway, we have already covered as much of the color, and now we will go further into bits of trivia or the history behind it.

Burgundy was derived from a region in France called Burgundy (of Germanic Burgundians origin)  which produces (you guessed it) wine! Hence, burgundy wine in colour. Why is it associated with Royalty? Personally, I think any color can be considered a royalty, really but it is just my thought. However, some theories say (or if you look into the internet) that in the medieval era, the closest thing it represents is blood, and of kin (no wonder!) valor, patriotism and anything the high society or higher class of families presents. And that sounds plausible, I say.

From this standpoint, that is everything you need to know about how to make burgundy and what colors make burgundy, for sure there are other ways too, depending on how creative you can be. I hope you use this color in wonderful illustrations! Be it in painting, symbols, personal meaning, and other stuff you can come up to.

What Colors Make Burgundy

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