Color is a funny thing. On the one hand, it’s subjective; there is no universal favorite color. But on the other hand, it’s objective; a company like LEGO needs everyone to agree on what the color blue is. LEGO colors similarly have a duality. They need to be descriptive, understandable, and static while also changing over time to meet current consumer preferences. These changing needs are how, over time, you find yourself explaining to kids what ‘Azure’ means or how they get the sand in sand green.

With that conversation in mind, I assembled my brain trust (i.e. my three boys, ages 4,6, & 8) once more to see if a topic makes any sense to LEGO’s core demographic. Previously, the brain trust looked at symbology in LEGO instructions and part names/acronyms from the AFOL community. This time, we’re going to dive into the wacky world of LEGO color names.

According to BrickLink, there have been a total of 93 solid (i.e. no transparent or metallic) colors throughout the companies history with 47 of them currently in production. For a fascinating rundown on LEGO colors, check out this article from Chris from earlier this year. In today’s session, I showed each member of the brain trust one picture at a time of a representative piece for each color.

Official LEGO Color: Blue

Obviously, we started a little easy out of the gate. All three members of the panel nailed this one.

4yo: Blue? Yeah, blue.

6yo: Blue, 100%.

8yo: Blue

Official LEGO Color: Purple

Again, pretty easy to start. All three members got this one too, but I was regretting using pieces with any printing on them. Before clarification, the youngest member of the panel called this color “Greenstripe little yellow mostly purple.”

4yo: Purple

6yo: Purple! Are they all this easy?

8yo: Purple. Why are you even asking me that? I know purple.

Official LEGO Color: Violet

Now we’re starting to get tricky. Apparently, when teaching out children colors we neglected to mention violet a single time, because the panel swore up and down they’d never heard of that color. In fact, the moderator of the panel (me) was accused of making up the color on the spot. This hazardous allegation would become a common theme before the day was done. Also, the middle child of the panel started yelling, “COME ON” increasingly loud every time I told him the correct color:

4yo: Bluish Purple

6yo: Blue Again

8yo: Blue Again

Official LEGO Color: Blue Violet

It was at this point the brain trust started to get angry at me about colors. “How can it be blue and violet? We already did those colors. I’m not kidding. HOW? Tell me!)

4yo: Light Blue

6yo: Sky Blue

8yo: Blue Again

Official LEGO Color: Lavender

It was as this time the panels started to realize this went beyond the primary colors. Admittedly, lavender is not usually high on a kids favorite color list, but I assumed at least one member of my panel had heard of the color before, but they all reacted as if I told them the color was called something like ‘Nicholas.’ This was the last time any of them guessed a color with any certainty.

4yo: Dark Purple

6yo: Bluish Purple

8yo: Violet

Official LEGO Color: Sand Purple

Outside of LEGO, I’ve not heard anyone use sand as a descriptor for a color, so I’m not sure if that’s a common color term. I guess if I’m looking at purple, and then I’m looking at sand purple, I guess I understand what they’re getting. Our panel, however, did not. “What do you mean sand? How did they get sand in the piece? Sand is brown and tan and white sometimes. It’s not purple,” said the six year old.

4yo: Grey, wait no, no, Silver.

6yo: Dark Purple

8yo: Purplish Violet

Official LEGO Color: Salmon

Again, maybe they haven’t heard salmon used as a color, but surely, living spitting distance from the Columbia river in the Pacific Northwest, surely they have heard of salmon as a concept, correct? But apparently it’s time to visit the salmon hatchery because the panel was upset about this color as well. When I explained where the name came from, the youngest one said, “but it’s not a fish it’s a hat. An orange hat. It can’t be that and a fish.”

4yo: Earth Orange

6yo: Orange

8yo: Pinky-orange

Official LEGO Color: Light Nougat

What is Nougat? I don’t know. I’m assuming it’s some sort of sugar product. I could Google it, but I prefer to live a life of whimsy. “Wait, what does nougat look like on it’s own? When it’s not a LEGO piece?” I don’t know son, and at this point, it’s been too long for me to ask. At this point, I was starting to consider making an appointment with the eye doctor for the panel members. They were seeing shades of violet and grey in that piece.

4yo: Tan

6yo: Grey

8yo: At first I think it’s tan, but then I think it’s violet or something. It’s tricking me. Tan I guess.

Official LEGO Color: Coral

Personally, coral is one of my favorite LEGO colors. I love the way it jumps out and the vibrancy is great for underwater sets. After learning the name, I was again accused of making up colors. “Coral is a plant, what are you even talking about? I’ve seen pictures of coral, some of it’s BLUE.”

4yo: Tan

6yo: Grey

8yo: What was the other one? Salmon? I say salmon because I guess because it looks the same. Wait, no! Ah ha! LIGHT salmon!

Official LEGO Color: Light Purple

I had to make clear to the panel that I didn’t repeat any colors. They required a lot of persuasion to understand that this was a different kind of purple than the first version. “Light” as a color descriptor seems a little subjective as well. I was unable to find any evidence that ‘light’ or ‘dark’ have any scale, i.e. light means exactly 50% less saturation. The team got some confidence from this piece though, as they at least understood the concept of light purple vs say salmon. Also, the four year old was officially over this exercise as of this color and began phoning in his guesses.

4yo: Shirt purple.

6yo: Bluish Violet

8yo: Purple. But I don’t feel good about it at all. I think you’re trying to trick me. I don’t know. Dark Purple. (lol. I was close! I was so close!)

Official LEGO Color: Pink

A desperately needed win for the team at this point is the only reason any of them kept playing along. This was mostly a slam dunk, but the photo showing the light reflecting off the piece threw them a little bit.

4yo: Pink

6yo: Sparkly Pink

8yo: Light Pink or pink. Just pink I guess.

Official LEGO Color: Sienna

For some reason, the color burnt sienna sticks out in my mind. It must have been in my Crayola box as a kid. So when sienna was introduced recently as part of an effort to broaden the number of available skin complexions, I had some warm feelings. Our panel must have a different box of crayons because they were not familiar with the color.

4yo: Light Brown

6yo: Brownish Tan

8yo: Light Brown

Official LEGO Color: Dark Yellow

I didn’t think this one would be as easy, but 66% of the panel nailed it. Again, it does bring up the question of how dark is dark? If anyone out there knows how they decide on dark, light, medium, etc, please reach out!

4yo: Yellow Yellow Yellowish Yellow

6yo: Dark Yellow

8yo: Dark Yellow

Official LEGO Color: Rust

I mentioned that colors are subject, but personally I don’t see rust in this color. I find the next color, reddish orange, to be much more rust-like. This rust is a browner, softer rust. It threw our panel for a loop, but admittedly, I’m not sure if they know what rust looks like.

4yo: Brown Black and White. Woof. Woof. Dog color.

6yo: Brownish White

8yo: Reddish Brown

Official LEGO Color: Reddish Orange

This was the 15th color present to the panel, and I would say that if you ever find yourself in a situation where you’re quizzing children on what color certain LEGO pieces are, 15 is plenty. It’s probably fine to stop there. Your panel will begin losing interest rather quickly. They got pretty close with this color though.

4yo: I don’t know. I don’t know. I don’t know. Please don’t ask me again.

6yo: Reddish Orange.

8yo: Orange? But I know it’s a no. Because you’re not telling me I was right. Wait no, dark orange! Why do you keep typing what I say?

Official LEGO Color: Earth Orange

Asking kids about color often gets philosophical. Are turkeys orange? No, but this one is. Also, when I hear earth, I think the dirt beneath my feet, but for my kids they go straight to planets. Watching them reason out how to get to a given color is fascinating. It’s also hilarious when they say things like, “But…but..that’s just orange! Orange is on earth! There’s no Moon orange or Mars orange. You’re not going to trick me with your weird fake colors!”

4yo: Light Poop

6yo: Brownish White

8yo: Orange. But turkey’s aren’t orange. Brownish orange. Or Brown. I don’t know.

Official LEGO Color: Medium Orange

Direct quote from my aggrieved eight year old son, “What! What is that! There’s no such thing as medium orange. That’s just orange. Because there can be dark or light orange but not medium. Medium should just be orange. Dark is large orange, light is small orange. Medium is means middle, which is just orange. This is wrong and I hate it.”

4yo: Orange yellow and black.

6yo: Yellow, wait, yellowish orange.

8yo: Orange

Official LEGO Color: Orange

At this point, they were too traumatized by ‘turkey orange’ to just guess orange and psyched themselves out of guessing the obvious color.

4yo: Orangey Orangey Orangey

6yo: Sandy Orange

8yo: Some kind of weird orange, I don’t know what’s true anymore.

That just about wraps it up for this installment of LEGO According to Kids. I had more colors for them to guess, but when the eight year old said, “What does Azure mean? You know what, forget it! I’m done,” I took it as a sign.

This article made my panel more angry that I would have anticipated, and I’m not sure they have fully recovered. Does that mean that LEGO color names need updating? (Perhaps we should have started with the basic current colors rather than a deep dive. Next time!)

What are your favorite LEGO colors? Are there any names that make you smile?

How do you think you would do in this survey? Would you ever eat an orange turkey? Let us know in the comments below!

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