On the subject of Supermarine’s house colours these seem to have varied a bit over the years. Judging from B&W photos, always tricky, the S5 in 1927 was painted with a lighter shade of blue than that used for the S6 in 1929. The S6b in the Science Museum has two shades of blue paint. There is a relatively bright blue as the original paint on the floats, and a darker shade has been painted on top of this and is also the base coat on the fuselage (no primer). My personal opinion is that this top coat is not ‘Supermarine’ but when it was applied and why they chose such a dark shade is a bit of a mystery.

Cheers

SM