What is cornflower blue?

Image courtesy of Patou / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Cornflower (image to the right) is a strong light to medium blue flower with a slight violetish tone. Due its beauty its used as a reference point when describing other objects including sapphires.

As you can imagine it is very difficult to define a colour of a natural sapphire by comparing it to a colour of a natural flower. There is no definite mix of colours and cornflowers themselves have slight variations of colour amongst them. Without a doubt colour of a sapphire should be described by its hue, saturation and tone. 

Ceylon sapphires are most famous for their lighter blue colours, and many are close to “cornflower blue”. In the world of sapphires “cornflower blue” is a prestige term and is a highly priced colour. Hence, you see the misuse of this term with some even referring to darker blue sapphires as “cornflower blue”.  

You should always appreciate and love what you see and not the terms used to describe them. In saying that, these terms are still commonly used. If you ever wondered what cornflower blue is, it is more or less a strong light to medium blue with a slight hint of violet.