Discovering Your Personal Color Palette Part 1: What's Your Skin Tone?

Have you ever noticed that some colors make your skin glow while in other colors you look chapped and ashy? Some make you shine while others wash you out? That has to do with your particular skin tone .…. Yup that is a loaded topic because there are SOOOO many shades! But that’s just it. We aren’t talking about skin SHADE but the undertone. The undertone of your skin stays the same whether your are freshly tanned from summer or a little bit on the light side from hibernating all winter. In the most basic of terms it is the complexion of your skin.

It is the under tone of your skin that makes you look lit in that hot pink dress and less than 100 in that turquoise top. I get a lot of questions asking what is the best color for you based on skin shade and hair color but skin tone is the reason why some colors look great and other not so much.

There are 3 basic skin tones; Cool toned, Warm toned, and Neutral or Olive toned. Let's figure out which one your are. There are a number of different ways to find out ...

1. Do you Tan or Burn?

Warm Toned: In the sun you tan and your skin turns a golden-brown

Cool Toned: In the sun you burn and turn pink first. Fair-skinned cool-toned girls will simply burn, while medium-skinned cool-toned girls will burn then tan.

2. What's your poison; Silver or Gold?

Warm Toned: Gold and Rose Gold tones make your skin glow.

Cool Toned: Silver and Platinum metals make you look radiant.

Neutral/Olive Toned: You look on point in both colors of jewelry

3. What is your Neutral?

Warm Toned: Does your face, eyes, and lips come alive when you wear browns, tans, or ivories?

Cool Toned: Pitch blacks and crisp whites make your skin shimmer.

Neutral/Olive Toned: Greys and charcoals are your preferred neutrals.

Last but not least there is the old tried and true method.

4. What does your wrist say?

So there you have it! With these four different "tests" you should be able to figure out what your skin UNDERTONE is. But what do you do with this information? In part 2 we will find the perfect colors to bring out the glow in your skin whether you are tanned or not! We will do this by figuring out what "season" your skin tone, hair color, and eye color fall into.

Thanks so much for exploring this topic with me! Until next week, stay runway ready my friends. Much Love, Stacy

Stacy Williams is the owner and designer of the Aesthetik. After many years of working in the NYC fashion industry, she relocated back to her home state of Texas and is now a professor of fashion. She lives in a quiet Houston suburb with her husband, a naked dog, a buff colored tabby cat, and lots of plants.