Placeholder text in search box is hard to see and has low contrast

[thisisalistairsaccount]

On the projects page, the search box that includes the text "Type to search" is quite hard to read and the contrast is really low.

Input box is: rgb(235,236,240)
Placeholder pseudoclass is: color: rgb(235, 236, 240);
Contrast ratio is 1.18, well below WCAG of 4.5 as https://www.w3.org/WAI/WCAG22/Understanding/contrast-minimum.html

Suggested colours that would meet are listed at the bottom of https://app.contrast-finder.org/result.html?foreground=rgb%28235%2C+236%2C+240%29&background=rgb%28255%2C+255%2C+255%29&ratio=4.5&isBackgroundTested=false&algo=HSV&lang=en

Using one of the options, rgb(107, 114, 140) which has a ratio greater than 4.5, gives the following result: