How to Use a Split Complementary Color Scheme…Lovely!

The split complementary scheme is a variation of the standard complementary scheme. It uses a color and the two colors adjacent to its complementary color. 



Split-Complementary Color Scheme



An example of such three colors are yellow-orange, blue, and violet. Another split-complementary harmony is blue with red-orange and yellow-orange. The split complementary scheme offers more possibilities than the complementary scheme, and yet it has strong visual contrast for a striking effect.

Tips:

1. Use a single warm color against a range of cool colors to put an emphasis on the warm color (red with blue-green and a greenish yellow-green, or orange with blue-violet and blue-green).

2. You might wish to avoid using desaturated warm colors (e.g. brownish reds, brownish oranges, or dull yellows), because this may ruin the scheme.