Figure 5

Personal project. This theme was built for my own use and generated with AI assistance. I don't expect anyone else to use it.

A dark terminal and editor colour theme inspired by Charles Demuth's 1928 painting I Saw the Figure 5 in Gold. Designed with red/green colour blindness in mind — greens are shifted to yellow-green (~85° hue) to stay distinguishable from red.

Three variants are provided — two warm, one cool:

Variant	Background	Character
figure5-warm-charcoal	#1E1B19	Very dark, faint warm undertone
figure5-softer-warm	#252220	Slightly lighter, warmest of the three
figure5-cool	#1C1C1C	Pure neutral grey, cool blue-grey whites

Palette

The warm and cool variants share all accent colours. Only the background and whites differ.

Shared

Role	Hex
Foreground (warm)	#F0E0B8
Foreground (cool)	#D8DDE4
Selection	#5C1A1A
Black / Bright Black	#1C0A0C / #8A6448
Red / Bright Red	#CC2211 / #FF3322
Green / Bright Green	#6CB200 / #78E000
Yellow / Bright Yellow	#E0CC1A / #FFD420
Blue / Bright Blue	#4878C8 / #5080D0
Magenta / Bright Magenta	#B84078 / #C04880
Cyan / Bright Cyan	#5A90A0 / #68A8B8

Per-variant

Role	Warm variants	Cool variant
Cursor	#FAF0D0	#E0EAF0
White	#CDBA90	#C4CED8
Bright White	#FAF0D0	#E0EAF0

Screenshots

Warm Charcoal

Softer Warm

Cool

Preview

make preview       # warm variants
make preview-cool  # cool variant
make showcase      # full showcase (palette + Helix + k9s)
make screenshot    # regenerate screenshots

Installation

make           # install everything (symlinks by default, except vscode/cursor which always copy)
make ghostty
make zed
make helix
make k9s
make zellij
make fresh
make claude
make vscode
make cursor

make INSTALL_METHOD=copy   # copy files instead of symlinking (ghostty/zed/helix/k9s/zellij/fresh/claude)

Ghostty

Symlinks (or copies) themes to ~/.config/ghostty/themes/. Then set in ~/.config/ghostty/config:

theme = figure5-warm-charcoal
# or: figure5-softer-warm, figure5-cool

Zed

Symlinks (or copies) zed/figure5.json to ~/.config/zed/themes/. Then set in ~/.config/zed/settings.json:

"theme": "Figure 5 – Warm Charcoal"
// or: "Figure 5 – Softer Warm", "Figure 5 – Cool"

Or open the theme picker (Ctrl+K Ctrl+T) and search for "Figure 5".

Helix

Symlinks (or copies) .toml files to ~/.config/helix/themes/. Then set in ~/.config/helix/config.toml:

theme = "figure5-warm-charcoal"
# or: figure5-softer-warm, figure5-cool

k9s

Symlinks (or copies) .yaml files to ~/.config/k9s/skins/. Then set in ~/.config/k9s/config.yaml:

k9s:
  ui:
    skin: figure5-warm-charcoal

Fresh

Symlinks (or copies) .json files to ~/.config/fresh/themes/. Then select via the command palette (Ctrl+P → "Select Theme"), or set the theme field in ~/.config/fresh/config.json:

{ "theme": "figure5-warm-charcoal.json" }
// or: "figure5-softer-warm.json", "figure5-cool.json"

Claude Code

Symlinks (or copies) the .json themes to ~/.claude/themes/ (requires Claude Code v2.1.118+). Then pick one with the /theme command or the /config picker:

/theme
# choose "Figure 5 – Warm Charcoal", "Figure 5 – Softer Warm", or "Figure 5 – Cool"

Claude Code hot-reloads on save, so edits apply without a restart. The theme colours Claude Code's own UI (spinner, status, diffs, mode borders); the terminal background comes from your terminal's colour scheme, so pair it with the matching Ghostty variant.

VSCode / Cursor

Copies the extension to ~/.vscode/extensions/figure5-theme-1.0.0/ (or ~/.cursor/extensions/). VSCode and Cursor don't support symlinked extensions, so this always copies.

make vscode   # installs to ~/.vscode/extensions/
make cursor   # installs to ~/.cursor/extensions/

Then open the theme picker (Ctrl+K Ctrl+T) and search for "Figure 5", or set in settings.json:

"workbench.colorTheme": "Figure 5 – Warm Charcoal"
// or: "Figure 5 – Softer Warm", "Figure 5 – Cool"

Reload the window after installing (Ctrl+Shift+P → "Developer: Reload Window").

Slack

No installable file. Go to Preferences > Themes > Custom Theme and paste a colour string from slack/figure5.txt.