I am planning on building a 7wt 4pc fly rod very soon and have settled on the Sage XP blank. Best I can tell, the Sage XP fly rod blank is a dark brown colour. I plan on using a thread colour the same colour as the blank for wrapping the guides and will use metallic gold for a bit of trim. My question is, what can you recommend for a thread colour / brand that would best match the colour of the XP blank? (I live in Canada and have no access to a store I can attend to in person and will be ordering online. As well, I had planned on using Gudebrod dark brown). Any opinions or experience would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

The XP is more of a dark greenish brown(definitely more green than brown though) color,and as far as I know,Sage uses Gudebrod 340 gold without CP on their wraps for the factory rods.This ends up making a translucent honey or golden brown color that goes quite nicely with the blank.

Any of the shades of green(especially dark green) and shades of brown(I would use one of the lighter browns without CP to darken it) would look nice on this blank,as would the 340 gold(like Sage uses),and maybe some of the other lighter colors in the tan,yellow,or orangy shades like 209 goldenrod,257 rust(one of my favorites without CP,which turns to a orangy brown),and 200 sunburst(used on the factory SLT),all without CP to darken them and help them take on some of the green blank color.206 garnet without CP would probably look great as well(garnet looks great on just about everything,LOL).

Another color that is one of my favorites is black/orange Classic Twist without CP.The thread looks more like a combination of dark and light brown,with a hint of orange to it without CP,kind of like wood grain.I love this look on a brown blank especially,but it looks great on just about anything and really goes nicely with a medium to dark brown burl wood insert seat.

Besides Tony excellent and detailed explanation, I can say I have used Medium Gray (actually I´d call it Ash Gray), with metallic (dark blue) trim on XP blanks and it is one of my friend´s favourites custom rods.
Also, I have used Scarlet with Silver metallic trims and looks good, but this was for a friend´s special order. I wouldn´t particularly use this combination.

I hope this helps!

Adolfito