Apple Beige

Apple Beige, also referred to as "Putty", is the color used by Apple Computer for the cases of the early models from its Apple II series of computers. The color was also used on the Apple III, Apple Lisa and first compact Mac models.

History
The color was personally selected by Apple co-founder Steve Jobs in collaboration with industrial designer Jerry Manock. According to Manock, the closest value at the time in 1977 was 453 C (hexadecimal #BFBB98 ), but Jobs wanted a unique color. The closest color in the modern Pantone system is Pantone 14–0105 TPG (hexadecimal #C4C0AA ).



Because the color was externally painted onto early Apple II models, such specimens were observed to retain their color better with age. Touch up paint was also made available for these early models. Later models had color dye directly mixed into the plastic, causing them to yellow more visibly over time. Early compact Macs that were produced in such a manner simply used Pantone 453.

Apple Beige was superseded by "Fog" with the Apple IIc in April 1984, and then replaced by "Platinum" with the Macintosh SE and II in March 1987, which adhered to the newer Snow White design language developed by Hartmut Esslinger. Steve Jobs would later derisively refer to all off-white computer case colors as "beige".