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Colours for brunettes!! ;-)

Miss 1940's

Practically Family
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Roz Russell
 

deadpandiva

Call Me a Cab
Messages
2,174
Location
Minneapolis
I love jewel tones. Kelly Green is my favorite color. I don't look great in red but I can wear it. I can't wear Yellow at all, which is sad because I see alot of great vintage tops in yellow.
 

jayem

A-List Customer
Messages
371
Location
Chicago
Laura Chase said:
Personally I have no clear idea about what colors suit me, I have a difficult time figuring out if my skin tone is warm or cool. Any tips?

In the photo, your skin tone seems to be very warm, as you are pale but with a much red/pink undertone. But again, it could be just the camera.
Another good hint in figuring out if you are warm or cool is, which jewelery do you look better in? Gold or silver?
 

jayem

A-List Customer
Messages
371
Location
Chicago
I'm a natural brunette, but colors seems to be hard for me to find. My problem is, I'm naturally very, very pale with very dark almost black hair and very light blue eyes. I cant wear anything too dark or it makes me look like Elvira! True reds don't work for me either (only in makeup) and I can only wear darker shades of reds. Still makes me look like a vampire, though. I look good in yellows and creams, but they get so boring. Blues I have to be careful with. I can't wear true blues, it has to be a shade darker or lighter.
 

Laura Chase

One Too Many
Messages
1,354
Location
Copenhagen, Denmark
jayem said:
In the photo, your skin tone seems to be very warm, as you are pale but with a much red/pink undertone. But again, it could be just the camera.
Another good hint in figuring out if you are warm or cool is, which jewelery do you look better in? Gold or silver?

Gold, I believe, but I can wear silver too. I was looking at this site and I would say warm, but on the other hand, the right shade of purple really suits me too, some of those in the bottom left corner og the cool chart.

I find this so confusing. I can just use my eyes, of course, but I honastly find that very few colors make me look bad. Beige is the only color I know washes me out, and that color is on the warm cart on that site.
 

jayem

A-List Customer
Messages
371
Location
Chicago
Laura Chase said:
Gold, I believe, but I can wear silver too. I was looking at this site and I would say warm, but on the other hand, the right shade of purple really suits me too, some of those in the bottom left corner og the cool chart.

I find this so confusing. I can just use my eyes, of course, but I honastly find that very few colors make me look bad. Beige is the only color I know washes me out, and that color is on the warm cart on that site.

Blast, I meant to type 'cool' instead of 'warm'. To my eyes, you have a cool undertone.
 

Miss Cicero

New in Town
Messages
13
Location
London, U.K.
Laura - your skin tone looks quite cool (it’s a beautiful ivory sort of colour) but then your eyes/hair seem to be a warm brown… it’s probably best to experiment and just see what works. If you can carry off shades from both ends of the spectrum then heck, wear ‘em! Everyone is different and these kinds of guidelines can sometimes be too prescriptive, I think.

I’m a natural blonde/dyed dark brunette with warm skin, blue/green eyes and my hair has always had reddish undertones. But having been blonde – as well as bright red, apricot and various shades of brunette – I find that my current colour (L’Oreal Casting ‘Walnut’ if anyone fancies trying it out!) offers me the most choice in the colours I can wear. I went straight from light blonde to dark brown and found that 90% of the clothes I already owned immediately looked better with the brown hair. Colours that I really like now are old-gold yellow, apple green (although I’ve seen this look amazing with platinum blonde hair, too), warm purple and all shades of khaki and brown. Greys still look good provided they’re not too icy or blue-based. The only colour that looks MUCH worse on me now is black, so I avoid wearing it near my face. When I was blonde, black made me glow; now it just makes me look embalmed lol
 

mrswheats

One of the Regulars
Messages
194
Location
Northeastern Ohio
warm or cool tones

I actually went to the drugstore and used one of those cards from the L'Oreal "natural match" collection. You place a shade card over your wrist, and whatever disappears is supposed to be your shade (I have very dark brown hair and hazel eyes. I bought my first foundation in a cool shade, because I'd been told all my life that I'm a "cool" tone, and my husband HATED it (it made me incredibly pale, and not in a good way).
I went back and spent a lot of time staring at the card, and discovered that I really have a pale, neutral skin tone, which is why I can wear gold or silver jewelry. I bought that shade, and now my hubby doesn't beg me not wear makeup anymore lol
So, I recommend trying that to figure out your complexion.

As for colors, I love to wear jewel tones, blue-based reds, chocolate brown and pink. Any yellow shade looks awful on me.
 

TheKitschGoth

A-List Customer
Messages
407
Location
Brighton, UK
jayem said:
I'm a natural brunette, but colors seems to be hard for me to find. My problem is, I'm naturally very, very pale with very dark almost black hair and very light blue eyes. I cant wear anything too dark or it makes me look like Elvira! True reds don't work for me either (only in makeup) and I can only wear darker shades of reds. Still makes me look like a vampire, though. I look good in yellows and creams, but they get so boring. Blues I have to be careful with. I can't wear true blues, it has to be a shade darker or lighter.

I have the same colouring as you, pale skin, dark hair and blue eyes and can wear every colour except yellow. [huh]
 

Miss 1929

My Mail is Forwarded Here
Messages
3,397
Location
Oakland, California
No yellow...

no chartreuse, no reddish purple, no strong orange. I 'm a cool winter.
I look best in jewel tones, bright red or green, dark brown or gray or black, and cream rather than dead white.
My hair is rapidly going gray, I don't mind but right now it's only about half and half, so the total effect is mouse. So I am dyeing all but a few stripes back to my dark reddish brown. So far it works. But it seems each time I do it, I get a bigger contrast - hopefully in another couple of years I will be all silver. Then I will probably have to adjust my clothing colors a bit.
Me...
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dani

Familiar Face
Messages
67
Location
maryville, tn
my hair is naturally a dark brown almost black, but i dyed it yesterday, to a brown color that was pretty much the same, but not as flat of a color.i cannot remember the brand right now, but it is called havana brown, as for my skin tone, i have no idea, but my mom says i'm olive toned. i look very good in deep purples. mostly i wear black, purple, every once in a while red. i would love to try a deep green though. i guess i'll just have to try it, and see how it looks though.
 

Last_Chael

One of the Regulars
Messages
112
Location
Adelaide, South Australia
I'm unnaturally pale with dark brown hair and eyes that change between grey and green depending on what I wear (and my mood actually!). I'm pretty sur eI actually have Aboriginal from my father's side, but I was bleached at birth so I can't actually get any more tanned than i currently am. In fact, I would happily go paler if I could possibly managed to get rid of what tan I have. Hahah yes I'm a pale Australian, I often get asked if I'm originally from England as I stand out quite a lot from the rest of the suntan obsessed nation. My English friend has more tna than I do!!

I definitely have cool colouring, and have always tended to favour jewel tones and silver; particularly bright reds, blues, pinks and greens. Red and green are my favourite colours! Although I've lately been feeling the need to branch out and try some new things! I'm starting to wonder if I stick with the cooler spectrum, I might actually be able to wear colours that I've always loved but always been afraid to try - like yellow!! last year I found this gorgeous pale-ish apricot dress with brown spots that was just divine, and decided on a whim to try it on! Well imagine my surprise when it actually suited me really well (and I even asked a couple of other girls who exclaimed it was perfect for me!). So yeah I'm starting to garner up the confidence to start wearing cooler spectrum colours. I'm dying to try something in lemon!

Though I do try to stay away from pure black and white; if it's absolutely necessary, I'll wear ivory or cream. I have experiemented with hair colour; I've done black with fire engine red foils; black with red fringe; and then red-black, purple-black, platinum blonde and copper! But because of my skin condition (I have psoriasis) I was always paranoid about it irritating my skin so I decided to go back to my natural brunette (with a red undertone). And I'm loving it! :D

Of course my favourite thing about being pale with dark hair? I can wear bright red lippie and it always looks smashing! :D Is it any wonder that Snow White was always my favourite Princess (only recently overtaken by Giselle as my favourite!).
 

Goldfish

A-List Customer
Messages
336
Location
EU
yes, skin tones can differ from your color type, you can be a cool color type but have warm skin etc...
as for color theory you can say that spring + autumn are both warm types and summer and winter cool.
i have learned that when identifiying your color type, your natural hair color, eye color, face features and the colors you like are really important things.
 

Laura Chase

One Too Many
Messages
1,354
Location
Copenhagen, Denmark

Emmababy

One of the Regulars
Messages
297
Location
B'ham, England
Definitely the green. If the other dress was more of a warm brown rather than taupe I would suggest that. But in this case, definitely green.
 

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