A VERY PARTICULAR SHADE OF RED

Ahh… red cars. Love ‘em to bits.
My first was a Triumph that my mother sold to me. Sort of. At 16, I had ‘borrowed’ it, crashed it, had it fixed and then stood mute as she decided she no longer wanted it. At that point, I owned it – in all meanings of the phrase.
But that little red Triumph, two seats and a parcel shelf, became my first automotive love. It was the kind of love, despite the multiple flaws and breakdowns and tears, that never leaves you. I dream of her still.
Another English make, an Austin Healey, followed, also in handsome red livery. Had I been smarter, I might have noticed then a colour preference developing, but this sweetheart had a fold-down soft top, a feature so exceptional and exciting it required every bit of bandwidth my 20-yo brain could muster.
Red would wait.  
I raise the subject of vehicle colour because the most brilliant red in the automotive world, if not the entire world of colour (that’s 18 decillion varieties, 18 followed by 33 zeros) has entered my grey matter and taken firm hold.  
This colour is called Soul Crystal Red. Developed by Mazda, it is achingly, bewitchingly beautiful. There, I’ve said it.
Look, as a general rule, I don’t single out car companies for attention.  They have entire fleets of people to do that for them.
And as a general rule #2, I am suspicious about the names given to paint colours. Go to the paint counter at your local hardware store and check out the irritatingly longwinded names concocted for their chips.
Yellow becomes ‘clotted cream’ and mid-brown is now ‘dark master’ and neutral is now ‘evening haze.’ And that’s just my dining room.
Somewhere, there are high rises full of people with expensive degrees in English whose job it is to cook up colour names. And judging by the cost of paint, getting paid exceptionally well for the privilege.   
These folks also have sidelines contriving names for new lipsticks. But there too, it’s the same old-same old: overblown names for the actually ordinary.
To be blunt, the name Soul Crystal Red strongly suggests that a gang of hippie nomenclaturists, some with English degrees, somehow hacked into Mazda and imprinted this New Age drivel into their system and sensibilities.
Can Moonshadow Aquarius Karma be far behind? Let’s call this red beauty SCR for all our sakes.   
The company website talks about translucence and transparency and colour depth and saturation. Pretty words every one, but a single picture on that very same website is worth a million of them.
The picture says ignore the hippies and the website’s wordy worthiness. Just look. This is a paint colour that deserves a special accolade, its creators’ names added to the pantheon of great artists, its formula stolen by rival car companies, its own dedicated museum…
Too far? Nope!
Once seen, this is a red that cannot be unseen. Your eyes – well, mine – are not only drawn to the colour on the highway and wherever cars congregate, but once seen, your eyes actively search for it wherever there’s tarmac.
 This isn’t just me. The current Mrs. Kerr, a woman who cut her professional teeth as a Kodak-trained colour film analyser and corrector, knows colour (and most things) better than me. She also knows about correction, but that’s another article for another day.
She, too, has noticed Soul Crystal Red. And that Japanese and Korean automotive rivals have had a stab at their own version, each and every one failing miserably. Mr. Mazda is light-years ahead.
Red, of course, is the colour of fire and blood, intuitively associated with love and longing, power and passion, action and assertiveness, confidence and … (Sorry. Been reading those paint brochures again.)
For my part, I would hazard calling this a metallic cherry red. That’s wholly inadequate, but for those of you who haven’t yet taken in its remarkable beauty, at least I’m using three words in sequence that you know belong together.
And that’s the point. I may mock the SCR moniker, but that’s only because, frankly, as a baptismal name it’s utterly inadequate, not within ICBM range of describing the incandescent beauty of this colour.  
There’ll be future red paint variants from Mazda and elsewhere, and multiple websites, brochures and ads will be crying out for aid from those of us who love language. May I offer a few starter adjectives in praise?

• Lustrous

• Shimmering

• Luminous

• Scintillating

• Brilliant

• Rich

• Glorious

• Exquisite.

This is paint so deep you can swim in it.

Don’t worry about those people whose job is to brew names for the universe of colours. With a little short of 18 decillion colours to identify, they are going to be busy for a while yet.
Specially if they use three entire words of the English language for just one of them.