Twenty-six VS Code color themes drawn from thirteen realms of Middle-earth — each with a dark and a light mode. From the cozy green of the Shire to the ember glow of Mordor, pick the realm that suits your mood.
| Realm | Mood | Signature colors |
|---|---|---|
| The Shire | Cozy hobbit-hole | leaf green, candlelight amber, terracotta, parchment |
| The Grey Havens | Sea-mist & departure | sea-foam teal, dawn rose, lamp gold, silver-blue |
| Rivendell | Misty elven valley | blue-slate, autumn gold, twilight lavender, copper |
| Moria | Cold dwarven deep | mithril silver, steel blue, gold vein, black stone |
| Lothlórien | The Golden Wood | luminous gold, mallorn green, silver, golden cream |
| Fangorn | Ancient dim forest | lichen green, bark amber, mushroom tan, mossy parchment |
| Mirkwood | Spider-shadow & murk | murky green, venom purple, sickly chartreuse, shadow violet |
| Erebor | Dwarven treasure hall | dragon gold, ruby/garnet, bronze, warm stone |
| Rohan | Windswept golden hall | wheat-gold, field green, banner red, dark timber |
| Isengard | Industrial pits | furnace orange, iron grey, pewter, machine black |
| Minas Tirith | The White City | white stone, steel blue, crown gold, garnet (sable & silver chrome) |
| Mordor | Ashen waste | sulfur bronze, lava orange, ember red, dead-grass, ash |
| Barad-dûr | The Dark Tower | charcoal, ash-grey, blood red, ember (light = "Ashlands" grey & rust) |
Each theme styles the full workbench — editor, sidebar, tabs, terminal, git gutters, bracket pairs, status bar — plus TextMate and semantic syntax tokens.
Install
- Open the Extensions view in VS Code (
Cmd/Ctrl + Shift + X). - Search for Middle-earth Themes and click Install.
- Open the theme picker with
Cmd/Ctrl + KthenCmd/Ctrl + T(or Command Palette → Preferences: Color Theme). - All twenty-six themes appear grouped together — pick one.
Prefer the command line?
code --install-extension brycerichards.middle-earth-themes
Switching themes
Use Cmd/Ctrl + K Cmd/Ctrl + T at any time to preview themes — arrow through
the list and the editor updates live, so you can wander from Rivendell to
Mordor and back before committing.
Feedback
Found a color that feels off, or want a realm that isn't here yet? Open an issue at github.com/bryce-richards/middle-earth-themes/issues.
Contributing
The themes are generated from gen.py; each lives in themes/ as plain JSON
(UI colors under colors, syntax under tokenColors / semanticTokenColors).
To tweak a theme, edit a hex value and run Developer: Reload Window. To add
a new realm, add a palette block and key to the order list in gen.py and
rerun it — package.json and the preview data regenerate automatically. See
the repository for
details.