Deep Autumn · Colors to avoid
Deep Autumn colors to avoid, and what to wear instead
By the Skintonic team · SKINTONIC LLC · Updated
"Avoid" is a stronger word than this deserves, and Deep Autumn is not forbidden from owning anything. What the shades below do is specific and small: worn near a Deep Autumn face, in daylight, they make the skin do something you would rather it did not — go gray, go ruddy, go flat, or step back.
Deep Autumn is warm, deep and moderate, and every shade that fails does so for a reason that follows directly from one of those three. Knowing the Deep Autumn categories beats carrying a list of Deep Autumn names, because a category is something you can apply to a garment you have never seen before.
The categories, and why each one fails
Shades that are too pale
Very light color disappears against Deep Autumn's depth, and on its way out it takes the lower half of the face with it. On Deep Autumn the jaw softens, the edges go, and the whole face loses its shape.
4 of Deep Autumn's 6 listed shades fall here.
Shades that are too cool
Blue-based color against Deep Autumn's warm skin leaves a gray cast under it. The shade is not unattractive — it is that it makes a Deep Autumn face look like it needs more sleep than it has had, and the effect is strongest in daylight.
1 of Deep Autumn's 6 listed shades fall here.
Shades that are too clear
A pure, high-saturation color beats Deep Autumn's muted coloring outright. On Deep Autumn you stop being the thing people look at, the shirt starts being it, and the face above reads as faded rather than as soft.
1 of Deep Autumn's 6 listed shades fall here.
Three of them by name
Pastel Pink, Icy Blue and Neon Pink. Three is enough to calibrate your eye. If you can see why those three fail on Deep Autumn coloring, you can recognize the fourth and the fifth yourself in a shop, which is more useful than carrying a list.
The complete Deep Autumn avoid list — every shade, its exact value, and the reason it works against you — is in your report rather than on this page, which is deliberate.
What Deep Autumn should wear instead
Take the same color and move it toward gold: a warm version of almost any shade works on Deep Autumn where the cool version does not.
These eight are the safe Deep Autumn direction, and they are the same eight the free result hands you:
- Warm Deep Burgundy
- Pine Green
- Chestnut
- Deep Amber
- Espresso Red
- Deep Rust
- Burnt Orange
- Deep Mustard
Any of them near your face does the opposite of the shades above: they warm Deep Autumn skin rather than greying it, and they agree with one another, so any two of them pair without thought.
Check a specific color
If you are holding a garment and want an answer about that exact shade rather than about its category, the free color checker takes a hex code or a color picker and says where it falls against Deep Autumn specifically, in your browser, storing nothing.
Are you Deep Autumn?
A Deep Autumn avoid list is worse than no list at all if you are not Deep Autumn, because it will talk you out of colors that suit you perfectly well. Settling whether you are Deep Autumn takes one photo and about thirty seconds, and it is free.
Questions
What colors should Deep Autumn avoid?
As categories: too pale, too cool and too clear. By name, Pastel Pink, Icy Blue and Neon Pink are three of the Deep Autumn ones. The rest of the Deep Autumn list, with exact values and a reason each, is in the report — which is the part worth paying for and the reason it is not printed here.
Does "avoid" mean never wear it?
No. It means keeping it away from a Deep Autumn face, and nothing more than that. A shade on the Deep Autumn avoid list is perfectly fine as trousers, as a bag, as a coat you take off indoors, or anywhere below the waist. What the list is about is the light bouncing off a garment up into a Deep Autumn face, and that is a much smaller part of a wardrobe than it sounds.
What if I love one of the Deep Autumn colors to avoid?
Then wear it below the waist, or find the version of it that belongs in the Deep Autumn palette. Take the same color and move it toward gold: a warm version of almost any shade works on Deep Autumn where the cool version does not.
Is black on the list?
Not for Deep Autumn. Black is not universally bad; the question is whether a person's own coloring goes deep enough to meet it, and deep coloring does well enough that black stays off the Deep Autumn list.
More for Deep Autumn
Deep Autumn hair color · Deep Autumn makeup · Deep Autumn outfits · Deep Autumn in full