Colors for your features
Best colors for cool undertones
By the Skintonic team · SKINTONIC LLC · Updated
Cool undertones cover the summers and the winters, and those two families want almost opposite things. A summer in winter colors looks overpowered; a winter in summer colors looks faded. So "colors for cool undertones" is really two questions wearing one coat, and answering it as one is why so much of this advice fails in a changing room.
There are 6 cool types: Light Summer, Cool Summer, Soft Summer, Deep Winter, Cool Winter and Bright Winter. Silver over gold is the thing they all agree on. After that it is a question of weight — whether your coloring is soft enough to be blurred by a strong shade or strong enough to need one — and that is the division this page runs on.
The honest key point
Of the four factors, cool undertones is the one that rules options OUT; depth, contrast and chroma are what rule them back in. The cool types divide cleanly by depth: Light Summer, Cool Summer, Soft Summer and Bright Winter in the lighter half, Deep Winter and Cool Winter in the deeper one.
Cool undertones, lighter coloring
For Light Summer, Cool Summer, Soft Summer and Bright Winter, the palette stays in the upper half of the depth scale. Eight of their published colors:
- Rose
- Deep Raspberry
- Muted Burgundy
- Shocking Pink
- Cool Berry
- Blueberry
- Deep Sage
- Electric Blue
Cool undertones, deeper coloring
For Deep Winter and Cool Winter, cool undertones are carried at considerably greater weight. Eight more: what separates them from the set above is depth rather than direction, which is the clearest way to see what cool undertones do and do not decide.
- Deep Emerald
- True Red
- Wine
- Royal Purple
- Deep Navy
- Emerald
- Black
- Royal Blue
What cool undertones should be careful with
Golden and orange-based shades near the face
Mustard, camel, warm brick and golden brown each bring up whatever redness the cool skin behind cool undertones already has, and leave the rest of it faintly yellow in daylight. With cool undertones the effect is strongest right at the neckline and gone entirely below the waist.
Three outfits for cool undertones
Assembled from the cool undertones chips above rather than from a lookbook — the first piece sits nearest your face and has to be right, the second is forgiving, and the third is small enough to be a bag, a scarf or a shoe.
- TopRose
- BottomDeep Emerald
- AccentDeep Raspberry
- TopMuted Burgundy
- BottomWine
- AccentRose
- TopTrue Red
- BottomDeep Raspberry
- AccentMuted Burgundy
The 6 cool types in full
Each one has its own page with the whole explanation: Light Summer, Cool Summer, Soft Summer, Deep Winter, Cool Winter and Bright Winter.
Your exact palette depends on all four factors, not on cool undertones alone. The scan reads undertone, depth, contrast and chroma from one photo, shows you the three colors it took off your face so you can correct them, and names your type — free, in your browser, with nothing uploaded.
Get my palette from one photo — free
Questions
How do I know I have cool undertones rather than the opposite?
Three cheap tests, all at a window: silver sits in and gold brings up redness; cool pink freshens the cheek and peach makes it ruddy; blue or purple veins. The undertone test takes all three in order and says whether they point at cool undertones.
Can cool undertones change?
No, and that is what makes cool undertones worth establishing once. Undertone is the direction skin leans, and cool undertones will still be cool undertones in forty years — which is why the whole twelve-type system is built on that axis. Surface tone is a different thing and moves constantly with sun, flushing and the time of year, which is why a photo meant to establish cool undertones wants an ordinary day rather than the week after a holiday.
Which metal goes with cool undertones?
Silver, Soft / brushed silver and Bright / polished silver, depending on which of the 6 types you are. Across all 6 the answer points the same way, which makes metal one of the more reliable confirmations once you already suspect you are cool undertones.
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