Our colors
Color at Macy's begins and ends with the star. Red is the signature, black gives it structure, and white gives it room to land. Restraint is what keeps the red meaning something. The palette around them is broad on purpose, so the brand can stay narrow. No state, no tier and no mood ever has to borrow the red.
Red
Black
White
Palette
Every color in Thread resolves to one of these primitives. They are the only tier that holds a value of its own. Brand tokens alias them, semantic tokens alias brand, and components alias semantics. Ramps run light to dark and sit in hue order, so neighboring rows are neighboring colors.
Where the red star came from
Macy’s red is not a palette decision that happened to stick. The star came before the store. Rowland Hussey Macy is said to have carried it from a tattoo he wore after years at sea, and it followed him onto the storefront when he opened on Sixth Avenue in 1858. A mark that started as a personal souvenir became the thing people looked for from across the street.
That history is why red behaves the way it does here. It is not an accent to sprinkle on for warmth. It is the signature, and it earns its weight by being rare. Black gives it structure, white gives it room, and the rest of the palette carries the work red should never be asked to do. Reach for primary and you are reaching for the star.
Needs brand sign-off.This origin story comes from the widely published account of the Macy’s star rather than an internal source. The 2025 copy guidelines in this repository cover voice and tone only and say nothing about color or heritage. Please replace this with the brand team’s approved language before anyone treats the page as canonical.