The fundamental color skill for design is modifying one base color into many variations, not picking color-wheel palettes

Erik Kennedy’s core argument is that color theory approaches (split complementary palettes, triadic schemes, etc.) do not reliably predict good-looking designs. Instead, the fundamental skill is being able to take one base color and generate consistent-looking variations — darker, lighter, more saturated, less saturated — for different UI needs (hover states, backgrounds, borders, disabled states). This reframes color as a manipulation skill rather than a selection skill. The same principle applies to visual design for live-coded visuals: one base hue with controlled HSB variations creates visual coherence across an entire screen.

Examples

Facebook’s interface uses one base blue with darker variations for the search bar and lighter variations for backgrounds. Swell Grid’s surfcast app builds an entire palette from a single blue. The ‘chosen color’ matters less than the ability to generate consistent variations from it.

Assessment

Given a single color #4A90D9, describe how you would generate (a) a hover state, (b) a disabled state, and (c) a background color using only brightness and saturation adjustments.