This is an All Ears English podcast episode 1630.
Level up your color vocabulary in English.
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You should be able to describe colors in more depth for better and more precise English conversations.
Today, get four ways that native speakers add depth to their color descriptions in English.
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Hey, Michelle, how's everything?
Hey, Lindsay, Lindsay, Lindsay, Lindsay.
Two Lindsays, you're two Lindsays today.
What if your last name was Lindsay?
That would be crazy.
That would be crazy.
Yeah, everything is good today, I guess.
Apparently, I just called you Lindsay twice, but that's fine.
I'm doing good, Michelle.
Summertime.
Yeah, summers.
We're coming towards the end of the summer, kind of getting close to it.
But I'm really excited for some stuff that's coming in September for All Ears English, especially around grammar and business guys.
Keep your ears open for that.
There's going to be some great stuff.
Yeah, very exciting.
Lindsay, do you have a favorite color?
Oh, my gosh.
My favorite color.
I won't say yellow because let's see.
I like blue, but I can also get tired.
I think you can overdo it on blue.
So what about you?
What's your favorite color?
Yeah, I would say if you're asking me my favorite color, I would also say blue.
But okay.
I always we always joke that my favorite color is like that bluish purple color.
It's not purple.
It's not blue.
It's like somewhere in the middle.
It's where you actually I'm a little colorblind.
It's like I actually can't tell the difference.
I used to have in my one of my old apartments.
I painted an entire wall like an accent wall this color and I we called it blurple.
Blurple.
Are you really colorblind?
No, but like I have a I don't I don't know if I officially am not like for everything.
But I have a very, very hard time between blue and purple and orange and red.
Like very hard time.
Like, I mean, not if it's like very obviously blue or obviously purple.
But I let's just say that I get made fun of a lot by Dan.
Yeah.
He'll be like, wait, you think that's orange?
I'm like, what?
It is orange.
It's a common partner debate sometimes, colors, I think.
Yeah.
But are you someone that when you describe colors, you go beyond just like...
The green sounds like maybe maybe not.
Like last night.
I was looking at my mom's curtains here at the beach house and I said oh, are those seafoam green.
Right.
Like that specific color, like that depth of description.
Do you talk about stuff colors that way or is it just the color like green, blue, orange, purple?
I don't know.
I don't know.
I probably.
I think I do sometimes get a little bit like deeper, because sometimes you need to be more descriptive.
Actually, now that I'm looking around my room, I think that my my room is painted like a seafoam green.
You guys can probably see it like in the YouTube videos.
I don't know if you can tell with the lighting, but it's kind of a seafoam green.
Yeah.
So, yeah.
And then I don't know.
There are like a lot of, a lot of random names for colors, but that's what we're going to be talking about today, because we have this listener question.
I think this is going to be a fun one.
OK, this is going to be great.
It's good to talk about colors and an essential part of life is living in color.
And so we have to be able to describe it.
Right?
Exactly.
So this question is from Debbie from Taiwan.
Do you want to read it for us?
Sure.
Here we go.
So hello, all the hosts from All Ears English.
I've been listening to your podcast for about one year.
I've learned tons of useful vocabulary words and phrases.
I wonder if there are words to describe colors more descriptively.
Thank you for reading my email.
And your podcast is awesomely awesome.
Speaking of repeating words and names.
That's what I was just thinking.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Debbie and I are on the same page here.
Yeah, Debbie.
And Debbie's from Taiwan.
So thank you for that question, Debbie.
Fantastic, right?
Because that's really what this show is about helping you guys go one level deeper in how articulate you are in English, right.
Exactly, exactly.
So yeah, I really like this question.
I think it's going to be fun.
But before we get into it, we want to thank some very special people who have been reviewing us.
Yeah, so I want to call out a couple names of people that have reviewed the podcast.
Wherever you listen, make sure you go and leave a review.
So Jeralee Gomez Nazinin from Iran.
We have Masoud Nazari from the U.S., Let's see.
Who else?
Who else?
A lot of these are hard to read.
Syed Faridodin from Iran.
Guys, these are good reviews, Michelle.
Really solid reviews and ratings.
And we love seeing when you write a question inside your review as well.
That's a great way to ask a question, guys.
Yeah, love it, love it, love it.
So thank you to those people.
And if you haven't rated and reviewed us yet, please do so.
We'd love to hear from you.
Definitely.
And make sure you follow All Ears English.
Good stuff.
Okay, Michelle.
So, yeah, we've talked about colors a few times on the show.
We had Mignon Fogarty on from Grammar Girl, right?
In episode 1368, she talked about the origins of colors going into a little bit of history.
Yeah, that was really, really interesting.
What a great guest.
So we also had, I believe Jessica must have done a video for IELTS, right?
And this was IELTS vocabulary to deftly describe colors.
Oh, great word.
Definitely.
We'll let you guys go over and check that out to figure out what that means.
But guys, remember, we do a lot of IELTS stuff.
We have 14 years of examiner experience on our team.
So make sure you check out the IELTS Energy podcast.
Yeah.
Definitely.
And then we had episode 761, which was golden opportunity to avoid red flags and learn color idioms in English.
So idioms.
And then we had another one.
Lindsay, what is that one?
The last one?
There might be more.
Oh, my gosh.
558.
Way back.
More than 500 episodes ago.
A long time ago, but more than a thousand episodes. colorful 4th of July.
Yeah, a thousand episodes ago, you're right.
How to have a colorful 4th of July.
And when I think of the 4th of July, I definitely think of obviously red, white and blue, but lots of color.
Summertime.
Everything is alive.
The grass is green.
Well, at least on the East Coast, not so much out West.
Everything's dead in the summer.
But anyways, yeah.
Okay, awesome.
So, yeah, today we're going to answer Debbie's question.
This is a way to make talking about colors more fun and personal than just saying like blue or green, like Lindsay said.
I mean, sometimes those are useful because there's kind of always that neutral color like the one that you would always see come up as this color when you think of the first one.
But then sometimes it's not like something can be blue, but it's not exactly that blue, right?
Right.
I love it.
So natives have a certain thing that they say, a certain thing they do when it's like in between two colors.
What do they do?
Well, we do a few things.
I mean, so one of the things is to say, whatever color, okay, a colorish color.
Okay, so that sounds crazy.
But you could say like, for example, Michelle's hair is reddish brown.
Yeah, exactly.
Or brownish red, or whatever.
Brownish red, reddish brown, which do you prefer?
Yeah.
I don't know.
Yeah, I don't.
I guess what would be the difference between that?
I guess.
So the first one, like if you say reddish brown, is it more red than brown or more brown than red?
I guess that's a brown than red right, reddish brown?
I don't know that.
There's enough of a distinction between the two.
You know, i agree it's kind of yeah, so you guys can choose like you could decide.
You know, reddish brown, brownish red, they basically mean the same thing.
It's a combination of red and brown.
That's what i don't think people think too deeply about.
Like then, which one is it?
No no no, we won't go.
But I guess if you think about it very closely, you could decide.
But and then, like I said, my room, instead of saying you know, a seafoam green, I could also just say my room is painted a bluish green.
Right.
And that is kind of seafoam green.
So that's good.
So ish color, right?
Something is so you're combining two colors.
It's somewhere in between.
And yeah, I do think these are this is a really common way to talk about colors.
Yeah, I think so too because sometimes it's like a little bit of a mix of two colors, right?
Yeah.
So that's kind of a way to incorporate both to give somebody a better image because if I...
Yeah, I couldn't even tell you what color my room is exactly.
Like I would have to tell you either like a seafoam green or a bluish green or whatever.
I could not say if it's blue or green.
Right.
So that's when you really.
And so this is really useful for that moment.
Yeah, this is great.
I love it.
Really useful if you're just not quite sure or maybe you don't.
Maybe there is a special word for it, which we're going to talk about next.
Like that's seafoam.
Right.
You just don't know.
So you don't know the word.
Yeah.
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So guys, we want to know what you think of All Ears English.
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Michelle, what would be the next one?
Well, you can kind of compare it to something like what we were saying.
So so something and then the color.
So, for example, you might hear like fire engine red.
So, Lindsay, what kind of a red would that be?
That's a bright red.
I mean, that's the red that's on the fire engine.
I think it's the same color in every country.
I'm assuming at least it's just a bright, bright red.
You know, it's and maybe a little bit more orange.
Orangey is just bright, bright, deep, deep red.
Very, very, very red.
Right.
So even if somebody got like a manicure and you were commenting on the nails, you could say like whoa, I love your nails.
They're like a fire engine red, you know?
Right, right.
Or we have other examples would be midnight blue.
So it's kind of a dark, dark blue kind of at midnight.
It's dark.
So it's a dark blue forest green, which is similar to the green you find in the forest, in the woods.
By Michelle.
Mm hmm.
Or what else?
Have you heard of people say like candy apple red?
Like you know how, like candy apples are like shiny and Yeah, I mean I guess that one I actually haven't heard, but it makes total sense.
So guys, these are pretty intuitive.
The other one that I've heard that I'm not sure if this one makes as much sense is Jet Black.
Yes, for very, very black, like somebody's hair.
Yeah, this is often used to describe hair.
But it's interesting because jets, I mean, are they black or are they more white usually?
I don't know.
I guess it depends.
Yeah, this one I'm not really sure.
Yeah.
Yeah, that's just kind of a chunk, I guess.
That's kind of a chunk.
I wonder why that happened.
Yeah, yeah.
I love it.
Interesting.
Interesting.
This is a – I love this episode.
This is a really creative thing.
Yeah, this is fun.
I had a lot of fun planning this one.
I mean, like, so some of these ones are known, like, you know, Seafoam Green or Jet Black.
And then some of them are – you can kind of make it up.
You can say, like, oh, it's like a –
Dirt brown.
I don't know.
And where this would really come in handy is obviously when you go to the paint store.
They're going to have these, but way more than this.
They're going to have their own fancy colors and combinations, but it's good to have a baseline knowledge of these before you go, if you want to pick out paint different kinds of paint, right.
Yeah yeah right right, right.
And then another way is uh, light or dark, or i guess i could have also used um, put bright in here.
Bright yeah, would bright yeah like uh, just the most, what like the most, like vibrant, and the most vibrant that's a good word the most vibrant version of that color.
So so light blue is kind of like a weaker version of that color, i guess.
Right, watered down a little bit right, so you can say light blue or dark blue um, or bright blue or dark gray, or You don't really say bright gray.
There's no... No, gray is just gray.
Yeah.
Well, you could say dark gray for sure.
Light purple, dark purple.
Yeah, good stuff.
And then, Michelle, the fourth way, right?
Yeah.
So, I mean, there are even more ways than this, but we're covering four basics today.
Sometimes, have you heard people use like foods to describe?
Yeah, for sure.
For sure.
Yeah.
I thought of the first one like plum.
Sometimes you don't even call it purple.
Sometimes that dark purple.
I remember way back when I was picking out bridesmaids' dresses and would be looking at colors.
I don't know why.
I feel like it's a lot for clothing that people do this.
Maybe because it sounds nicer than like...
I don't know.
Maybe it just sounds nicer than like dark purple.
Like it sounds kind of elegant.
It's plum.
Yeah, that makes sense.
That makes sense.
It should be fancy.
You can't call a dress dark purple.
You have to call it something funny, something interesting.
Yeah, I hear this with clothes all the time.
I remember sometimes like you used to catch a few minutes of like one of those QVC shows and it's always like oh, this is a chocolate.
Like that's another one.
Chocolate.
It's like, it's brown.
Chocolate just sounds, mmm, it's chocolate.
Delicious.
It must be something with like sales tactics.
I don't know for clothes.
It must be.
It must be when it comes to decorating or clothing or anything interior or in terms of fashion.
And other examples of this are melon.
And I guess melon would be like a light green.
Is that what that would be?
I think of it more of like the orange color.
I guess it could be like a watermelon or a honeydew.
When I hear melon, I think of like a light orange.
Okay, you might be right.
I was just thinking about honeydew melon for some reason, but I think you're probably right.
More of an orangey, like a light orange.
Salmon is the color of salmon, right?
Pinkish orange.
Others, Michelle, that come to mind?
Anything else?
I'm sure there are so many.
Coral, but that's not a food.
Okay.
Right.
That's kind of another pinkish orange, but another version of pinkish orange, right?
Yeah.
So these are used like for?
You know that.
I think that especially that salmon, it's like a very specific color, you know.
So yeah, it kind of speaks for itself.
It's not even like a light something or a dark something like it's just like a salmon.
It's salmon.
Right.
Exactly.
And it might be like if you buy a pair of shorts in the summer, it's really common.
It's kind of a fashion thing in New England, kind of a preppy fashion thing to wear like salmon colored shorts.
Right.
It's like it's a New England preppy look that people wear.
So you always see people in their salmon shorts and their boat shoes out here in the summertime.
But there is one color that can have off to describe it.
And I think there's only one, Michelle.
What is that?
Off off white.
Why not off black?
Why not off purple?
I don't know.
I don't know.
We only use... Yeah, I only ever have heard off white.
It's like because there's like that like very bright white.
And you know, like when you're painting a room, like I don't think you really want it to be like bright, bright white.
Like that might seem sterile.
I don't know.
Maybe we have some interior designers here that will say... that's fine.
Like, I don't know.
But you know, a lot of times, like when people mean like painting a room white, it's really like an off way.
You know, like not so harsh.
Yeah, totally.
Totally.
And off-white.
Exactly.
That's how I would have described it too.
Very common for walls.
Of course, trends come and go.
But yeah, I think that's all like one of those timeless trends, painting your walls off-white.
And then I have to think of the 90s when I think of this, Michelle.
The neon colors.
Ah, the neon colors.
Yes, I know.
I was thinking of those too.
Like we could do a whole episode on a neon colors.
Well, I mean, you could even just be for a neon color.
Well, not in a neon really, but like hot, like there's hot pink, but you don't really say hot orange.
No, that's weird, right?
But we've got hot green, hot pink, hot.
What else?
Is that it?
It's just hot green.
I don't even know about hot green.
You say hot green?
I think you could, Michelle.
There was a day when there was a time, and I think this, this style of neon colors, are actually coming back, at least on the ski slopes, because I've seen it this year.
I skied a lot and I saw people in onesies, by the way, which is a one piece suit.
All right.
One piece snowsuit that are like hot colors.
Yeah.
Um, which is so crazy.
No, I think neon is very and I, I did just buy.
So the word chartreuse, you know, that color.
Oh, I don't know if I would even know what I think chartreuse is.
Like that highlighter green yellow, like I'm pretty sure that's called chartreuse.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but like that's very popular.
Like I bought a sweater in that color and the other day I tried on some clothes and usually what happens when I try on clothes is I like get nervous and then I leave.
Like I try them on and then I'm like I don't know okay, I have to leave, You panic and you leave.
I have a similar experience when I try to go shopping.
The war stand is always like oh, and I'm like okay, I'm going to go try and stub stuff on, and then I get overwhelmed and then I just leave.
But I did try on a very nice neon dress the other day, but then I got nervous and I left.
I wasn't sure what to do.
Neon dress.
Interesting.
Well, I do think there's something right now about like bright colors, because yellow, bright yellow is in right now, which I feel like I'm having a moment and Allers English is having a moment right now.
Um, because there's a lot of bright yellow out there.
If you go shopping right now, it's pretty cool.
Um yeah, and maybe that's just maybe that i was thinking about that the other day, is that a conscious choice of the fashion designers?
They know everyone's coming out of the pandemic, kind of sort of again, hold the phone on that.
Right, we're not.
We're having like a resurgence right now in the us of the delta variant.
But side point, I know.
I know.
But so maybe they were thinking, OK, at this time, people will be coming out.
They'll want bright colors.
They'll want to live life in color.
Right.
Yeah.
I bet that has something to do with it.
I really do think so.
I bet so.
Yeah.
Oh my gosh.
We could talk for days about colors.
Who knew?
So let's do a role play.
Okay.
We are in high school and we're shopping for prom dresses.
Oh man.
Okay.
Here we go.
Oh, that one over there is gorgeous.
Oh, you mean that short bluish purple dress?
Yes.
I love it.
I also like that light green one over there.
I don't love light green.
Dark green is gorgeous, though, like a forest green.
Yeah, or maybe that salmon one would be great.
Yeah, that's nice, too.
Ah, what a hard decision.
Brings back memories of the days, the days of shopping for dresses.
Oh, my gosh.
Michelle, this is great.
I mean, should we go back?
Let's go back through it real quick.
We're running out of time on today's episode.
Let's go back.
I know.
We're having too much fun.
It's really fun to talk about these colors because I love giving our listeners this level of depth on how they describe things.
It's so good.
Also really good for IELTS, by the way.
Lots of vocab here.
Lots of ideas.
Okay.
So I said, oh, you mean that short bluish purple dress?
Yeah, bluish purple.
So, guys, that's pretty intuitive.
It's a mix of the two.
And then light green.
We know what that means.
And then you said, I don't love light green.
Dark green is gorgeous, though.
Mm-hmm.
And then I got even more specific and I said like a forest green.
Right.
So again, like the green that you find in the woods.
And then I said salmon and I like the color salmon.
Well, maybe that salmon would be great.
Okay.
Yeah.
So guys, so when you hear people talk about salmon, they're not always talking about food.
I know.
Be careful there.
Yeah.
Like, oh, I like the salmon one.
And then you go out and buy a salmon.
A filet of salmon.
That would be awful.
No, don't do that.
Sometimes things aren't what they seem like.
This is good stuff, though.
I think we could definitely do follow up episodes.
Guys, if you have requests on color episodes, let us know.
But try, strive to push yourself to speak on this level of depth, because you're at the level to do it.
Right, Michelle?
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
There's a lot of variety here.
You can show your personality.
There's so many ways to say the name of a color.
So have fun with it.
That's my advice.
Yeah, good stuff.
All right, Michelle.
And guys, go and rate and review All Ears English wherever you listen to the show.
All right, Michelle.
Good one today.
I'll talk to you soon.
All right.
Thanks.
Bye, Lindsay.
Bye.
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