"Viking Style" Brouge lacing?

[Jock Scot]

Taupe is the French word for that creature you have been trapping all these years, Jock. I would agree with you that its colour is a very dark grey, verging on black that I recall from my days tying flies with the fur. Perhaps these names for different colours is just a way of romanticising what is actually just a rather dull and boring shade. I mean who would actually choose to wear brown when bison has a certain cachet about it? But of course if you really want to stand out there are more vibrant shades - like white��

Well done Ivor!

You beat me to it. According to some French friends that I happened to be speaking to just, they confirm that "taupe" or more accurately, "la taupe" is the French word for a mole.

[OC Richard]

You got me to looking up mole photos and I see that there are various species with differing fur colours, some North American species having a lighter coat than your British moles.

Darker or lighter, the colour does tend to be more or less halfway between brown and grey.

In ordinary US usage "taupe" generally refers to this midway colour, a colour which here in the US can't properly be called either "brown" or "grey".

An interesting thing is the way that different languages and dialects often draw the line between colour-names in different places along the spectrum.

I have seen, many times, UK clothing sellers using the word "brown" to describe tweed which generally in the US would be considered halfway between brown and grey. Americans would call the same tweed "taupe" (if familiar with that word) or "gray" or perhaps "brownish gray" or "gray-brown". More artistic types might call the same tweed a "warm gray".

[Father Bill]

An interesting thing is the way that different languages and dialects often draw the line between colour-names in different places along the spectrum.

And for heaven's sake, don't get us started on "khaki" (he said grinning mischievously and rolling his eyes heavenward).

[OC Richard]

So for reference here is what we here would generally call

Left: "brown"
Centre: "taupe" "brown-gray" "warm gray" (or even "gray" by some)
Right: "gray" (it looks more bluish than it is due to context)



About "cool gray" and "warm gray" here's a nice chart

[OC Richard]

And for heaven's sake, don't get us started on "khaki" (he said grinning mischievously and rolling his eyes heavenward).

Or "yellow"

[Silmakhor]

Or "yellow"

At the end of the day just give me a hexidecimal code and be done with it