Russian color palette

Do you want to distinguish colors like a professional colorist? Anastasia Karausheva, Enjoy Russian School tutor, has prepared for you Russian color palette guidance. With the help of it you will get the hang of colors!

Colors

Have you ever tried to say in Russian that your new friend has beautiful blue eyes? Or to convince a salesman in the shop that you like a red sweater more than a pink one? It seems now it is time to learn color names in Russian!
First of all, we will observe the main color palette and if you are an advanced learner, you will find more specific color names and their shades in the second part of the article. In the end, there will be some common phrases and idioms with color names. Something may seem familiar to you, but it will be useful to repeat some words and phrases you might forget.


Part 1. Basic colors+monochromatic colors

Almost all Russian children start learning rainbow colors, namely красный (red), оранжевый (orange), жёлтый (yellow), зелёный (green), голубой (light-blue), синий (dark-blue), фиолетовый (purple). These are the main colors widely used among Russians in everyday life.


Examples:

• Мне нравится красный цвет.
• Эта машина оранжевая.
• Моя мама любит жёлтые цветы.
• У неё зелёные волосы.
• Я купила голубое платье.
• Многие люди носят синие джинсы.
• Фиолетовый цвет мне не идёт.
  

We also shouldn't forget about monochromatic colors which are not included in the rainbow palette, but one can't do without it. Here we have чёрный (black), белый (white) and серый (grey).


Examples:

• Моя семья часто отдыхает на Чёрном море.
• В этом городе много серых домов.
• Художнику всегда нужна белая краска.

If you face a mix of colors that is hard to describe with all words above, try to make other compound adjectives using "color-color" scheme, where the first word is also a short adjective: сине-зелёный (blue-green), красно-оранжевый (red-orange), лимонно-жёлтый (lemon-yellow), серо-голубой (grey-blue).

Part 3. Idiomatic expressions

Now let's focus on some expressions which can enrich your vocabulary and understand better native speakers. There are a lot of such phrases, but we will touch upon only widely used ones.

Позеленеть от зависти means that someone is so envious that his face is becoming green and there is an English analog — to turn green with envy.
Example: Мои друзья позеленели от зависти, когда узнали, что я поеду учить русский в школе "Enjoy Russian".

Голубая кровь (blue blood) is used in an ironic way when you describe someone from an aristocratic and wealthy family.
Example: Она думает, что в её венах течёт голубая кровь.

Голубая мечта is a dream that will hardly come true, a pipe dream.
Example: Голубая мечта любого актера — получить "Оскар".

Смотреть на мир через розовые очки, or look at the world through rose-colored glasses. It is clear that a person, who is wearing pink glasses, doesn't look at things objectively.
Example: Тебе нужно повзрослеть и перестать смотреть на мир через розовые очки.

Чёрный день means hard time in someone's life, in English it sounds "a rainy day".
Example: Не нужно тратить всю зарплату сразу, нужно отложить деньги на чёрный день.

Фиолетово (literally it's purple to me) describes a feeling when something doesn't matter to you, when you don't care at all.
Example: Мне фиолетово (всё равно), что обо мне думают другие люди.

Have you already faced some of these expressions? Would you like to share more idioms that we didn't mention? To put your knowledge into practice and improve your communication skills come to Petrozavodsk Russian Language Courses or take our Skype lessons one-on-one with a professional teacher.

Enjoy learning Russian with us!