Forest Green
Retired1951-1959
A cherished collection crafted between 1951 and 1959 - this deep and rich green hue opens the door to a world of design possibilities, making a bold statement on your dining table. Pair Forest Green with earthy tones like rustic brown or warm beige for a cozy and inviting atmosphere, or create a striking contrast by combining it with crisp white or elegant black.
Production
Forest Green was retired in 1959, so it is a hunt for secondhand pieces now. Fiesta Factory Direct is where the colors still being made are, if you are filling a set.
Shop Fiesta Factory Direct (opens in a new tab)Notes on Forest Green
Forest Green came in with the 1951 reset and it's the deepest green Fiesta had made to that point - a good deal more saturated than the Light Green it replaced. Eight years on the shelf, retired in 1959 alongside Chartreuse and Rose. It's a genuinely dark plate, which is worth knowing before you buy a set: pale food reads beautifully on it and anything brown or green disappears. If you like it but want something you can still buy, modern Jade is the closest thing Fiesta currently makes, though Jade is cooler and a touch darker again.
Using Forest Green on a table
Forest Green carries enough color to lead a table on its own. Use it for the plates and let quieter pieces do the rest; two or three settings of it go a long way. Its mid lightness (L* 41) means most food reads against it without either washing out or vanishing. It separates strongly from a white cloth (6.2:1) and less so from dark wood.
Below, 5 combinations built only from colors Fiesta has actually produced. Each says which rule it follows, and which pieces you can still buy today.
Buy these to go with it
Forest Green was retired in 1959, but these are all in production now - the set you can actually finish buying.
Opposite on the wheel
Mulberry sits roughly opposite Forest Green in hue, which is the highest-contrast pairing the palette offers. The neutrals keep it from shouting.
All green
Every color here is from the green family, arranged light to dark. A single-family table reads calm and deliberate rather than busy.
- Sea Mist Green
- Lemongrass
-
Your color Forest Green
- Evergreen
Three-way split
Sapphire and Claret sit about a third of the way around the color wheel from Forest Green in each direction. Evenly spaced hues stay lively without any one taking over.
Next-door hues
These sit within about 55° of Forest Green on the color wheel. Neighboring hues blend instead of competing, which suits a table you want to feel warm rather than sharp.
- Ivory
- Sea Mist Green
- Chartreuse, 1997-1999
-
Your color Forest Green
Where Forest Green sits in the line
Forest Green took over from Green (Light) as Fiesta's green, and is noticeably more vivid than it - a clearly different glaze rather than a reformulation (ΔE 14.0). In 1951 it arrived alongside Chartreuse, 1951-1959, Gray and Rose, 1951-1959 and took the place of Blue (Cobalt), Green (Light) and Old Ivory on the shelf. What else happened in 1951 →
Closest colors in the palette
Ranked by CIEDE2000 (ΔE) against Forest Green. Under about ΔE 5 two colors are hard to tell apart side by side - useful when you are identifying an unmarked piece.
On the table alongside Forest Green
10 colors were in production at the same time: