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Have you ever noticed that one shade of yellow can make you look absolutely amazing while another makes you look exhausted? Or that some color combinations look chic and creative while others look like you got dressed in the dark? Why is that? Well, it all comes down to three elements of color that affect both how colors look on you and how they work together in your outfits. And today, we're talking about them. Let's get started. Hello, gorgeous. Welcome back to the Everyday Style School, the show that teaches you everything your mom never did about getting dressed. I'm your host, Jennifer mackey. Mary, after 25 years of dressing women with real bodies, real budgets and real lives, I know great style isn't about following one size fits all advice. It's about learning what works for you. Today, my friend, we are continuing our season of style fundamentals by talking about color. I know that you might be hoping this episode is going to tell you exactly how to find your best colors once and for all. And I hate to be the bearer of bad news, I truly do, but this isn't that. What we're going to do today is talk about the best basics of color or the reasons that some colors look better on you than others or look better together than others. I'm going to take a wild guess and say that a lot of you listening have had a professional color analysis, which is great, but if we took away your color card or your swatch fan, you'd still feel stuck. This is because you got the answers to the test and and there is nothing wrong with that. Color can be hard to understand and some people just have a gift for it. So by all means, utilize their resources. Take the shortcut. But when you have the answers to the test and you know how you got there, it all comes together in a way that makes it simple for life. Also, though our use of color often ends with what colors we should wear near our face, we don't learn how to pair colors in an outfit, so we often default to black pants and a colorful top, which it's fine, but there are so many more options out there. It's not difficult or complicated once you know the basic elements of color and a few simple formulas. So that's what we're going to focus on in this episode. There are a million quizzes out there to help you find your undertones or your best colors. Or you can use a service like your color guru, who we absolutely love and I will put a link in the show notes to her website with our discount code. Again, there is nothing wrong with using that shortcut. But you are doing yourself a disservice by not understanding how you got there. Today we're going to talk about the three elements of color, how they apply to finding the colors that look best on you, and. And how they work when pairing them in outfits. I'm going to share a couple of mistakes or mindset issues that I've seen women struggle with when it comes to color. And we're going to wrap up with some homework to help you see color differently, which is where this all starts. Let's start by breaking down color, shall we? Every color. Every single color, whether we are talking about colors on you, colors of clothing you put in an outfit, or colors of paint you put on a wall, is made up of three different elements. I'm going to keep this as simple as possible. So I acknowledge that this isn't an in depth, nuanced discussion of every element. That's not what I'm trying to do here. Just giving you an overview. The first element is temperature, or the undertone. This is the one that trips women up the most. But what you need to know is that element. Every color is one of three things. Warm, cool, or neutral. And by neutral, I don't mean wardrobe neutrals like navy, black, gray, tan, white. I mean neutral in that they're an exact balance of warm and cool undertones. If red is warm and blue is cool, and you mix them together in equal parts, that would be a neutral purple. You probably wouldn't consider it purple to be a neutral color, but that's what we mean by the temperature. If it's exactly the same amount of warm and cool undertone, it's a neutral. The second element is value, or simply light versus dark, like sky blue versus navy blue. You have high value colors like pastels, baby blue, pale pink, soft yellow. You've got medium value colors, which I like to think of as the eight count crayon box, and it's plain old red, blue, green. And then there are low value colors like navy, burgundy, or plum. I know it can be a little confusing to think of high value being light and low value being dark, but think of it like a spectrum with black on the bottom, which is low, and white on the top, which is high. In fact, values are changed by adding either white or black to a pure color to change their value. The final element is saturation or intensity. You might even heard this be called chroma. And this is whether a color is bright or muted. It's the difference between hot pink and dusty rose. Instead of Adding black or white to the pure color, this one adds gray. So the lightness or the darkness of the color doesn't change just whether or not it appears bright and clear or tone down and mute it. Now I'm going to tell you something crazy. I think that saturation is the biggest game changer when it comes to color. When I realized that I needed to lead with brighter, clearer colors, it got so much easier to find colors that I felt good in and I felt look good on me. And it's a huge element when it comes to putting outfits together as well. This is probably the one that women think about the least, but I think it should be where you focus first, especially if you struggle to see warm versus cool, which that is admittedly hard. So let's talk about how these three elements apply to colors on you or finding your best colors. There are three big mistakes I see women make when it comes to colors that look good on them, and they all have to do with temperature or undertones. The first one is writing off entire color families because one shade didn't work. Like, I can't wear yellow. Every season, when we release our color palette for the capsule guide, our whole team, we just collectively hold our breath because we know the first comments will be, I can't wear yellow. I can't wear pink. It's like that Game of Thrones meme, brace yourself. Winter is coming, but in our case, it's brace yourself. The color comments are coming. But here's the thing. There are warmer yellows and cooler yellows. Warm pinks, cool pinks, warm browns, and cool browns. You know, it's funny, if you've ever painted a room in your house, especially if you've ever painted anything gray, you know that there are a million shades of every color and. And they all have different undertones that change how the color looks. But when it comes to our clothes, we tend to lump them all together. We had a Style Circle member share a photo. I think it was from the summer capsule. Maybe it was from spring. And she said, I thought I couldn't wear yellow, but then I discovered this shade that I feel amazing in. I shared the photo on Instagram, so you can go back and scroll and check it out, but it was just finding a different shade of a color she thought she couldn't wear. And all of a sudden, a whole new world was open to her. The second mistake women make with finding the temperatures that look best on them is only thinking about their skin. Yes, your skin's undertones matter, right? If you have cool undertones, meaning that you have kind of a pinky look to your skin. You probably look best in cool colors if your skin has warm undertones. If you have golden tones to you, warm colors are probably best. But your coloring is an overall visual value between your skin, your hair, and your eyes. Often, women can't figure out their skin's undertones, so they just give up. Your hair might actually be easier to identify, or maybe your eyes give a bigger clue. So don't just get stuck on your skin and give up if you can't figure that out. This, to me, finding your skin's undertone is one of the hardest things I think, when it comes to color, to do. I really do. This is like, I need a professional to do this. So if you can't do it, don't feel bad, all right? The third mistake women make with the undertone or temperature thing is thinking it's the only element that matters when it comes to how colors look on them. And it's not. At best, it's just one third. So let's talk about the other two. The second element is value, which is how light or how dark a color is. When it comes to value and how colors look on you, the question simply is, do you look better in darker or lighter colors? This one is actually very easy. You can just. You can just look. You can hold up a black shirt or a gray shirt or a white shirt and start to see that some look better on you than others. But don't forget that not all colors are created equal and color is a spectrum. For example, navy is one of my best colors, but not every navy. J. Crew factory's antique navy is fabulous on me. It's one of my favorites. I get compliments every time I wear it. Banana republic's preppy navy, though, it's just too dark. It swallows me up. I look completely washed out. So while navy is a darker color, I need to stay on the lighter side of it. Finally, the most forgotten but my personal favorite element is saturation or intensity or chroma. I don't care what you want to call it. If you want color to be easy, try focusing here first. Again, this element is all about how clear or bright versus how muted or dusty a color is. I remember a dress that I bought after I had my first daughter. You know those postpartum days where you just feel really, really great about yourself? Yeah. Well, I had to give a presentation in the class that I was taking, and I had to find something to wear. I had nothing that Fit went to the mall. I found this dress tunic thing to wear with leggings, and it was really cute. It was really me. And most importantly, it was really, really forgiving. So I bought it, and I wore it for the presentation. And then I never, ever, ever pulled it out of my closet again, even though it was not cheap and it should have been great. But every time I put it on, I felt just drab and washed out, and I couldn't figure out why. I'd had my colors done. And I knew that a lighter purple, which is what this was, was supposed to be good on me, but I just felt terrible in it. Years later, I learned about color saturation, and a light bulb went off in my head, and I actually thought about this dress, and I was like, ah, yes, that was it. That's why I hated it. It was a very dusty, muted purple. And if I look at my color card now, which is always sitting right on my desk, there is a shade almost identical to it on that card, but. But it's a clearer, brighter version that would have looked so much better. Like I said to me, this is just a super easy element to start with if you want to start looking better in the colors that you're wearing. It is much easier to see muted versus clear than warm versus cool, or even sometimes when dark is too dark or light is too light. One of our members, one of our Style Circle members, described muted colors that this way. And I think it's so helpful. She said, I look best in colors that look like they have a little dirt rubbed in them, which I think is just hilarious, but it's also totally accurate. When I think about my two sisters, both of them look better in those muted, more dusty colors. They look, like, a little bit garish in the brights that I go for, whereas I just look dull and drab in their muted color palette. It makes a huge difference, even if it's the same color and the same value, the saturation or the chroma, the intensity. Again, call it what you want. It can make a huge, huge difference. So here's what I want you to take away from how the three elements of color impact the way colors look on you. Your best colors are a combination of the right temperatures, the right value, and. And the right saturation. But it's a spectrum. This is really important to remember and embrace. Some colors aren't noticeably warm. They're just warmer, Right? Same with the other two elements. This is one reason that color can feel so difficult, because we want things to fall clearly on one side or the other when they usually don't. Same with your coloring. Sometimes you are noticeably warm or noticeably light or noticeably bright, whatever. Often though, no, there's a lot of gray area or in between that makes identifying colors tricky. This is one of those times. I think it's great to enlist some help, somebody who can see these things clearly. Also, though, don't stop at just trying to find your skin's undertone and giving up when you can't tell what color your veins are. And don't write a color family off completely. Get get the whole picture. And if seeing the undertones in a color is difficult for you, like it is for a lot of women, start with saturation, then look at value and finally at temperature. Start with the ones that are easy to see and you will be so much closer. All right, let's move on to how these three elements apply to colors in an outfit. And I want to start with the biggest mistake women make when combining colors. And that is they don't. I'm talking to you neutral pants and colorful top ladies, or you colorful bottoms and neutral top girls, which probably covers everyone listening right now. To be honest, most days that includes me too. It is not like I'm out here wearing bold color combos all the time. But if you never pair color with color or put more than one non neutral into your outfits, I think you're missing a big opportunity to add a little more style and interest to your everyday outfits. Now, I think there are a couple of reasons that we don't use more color in our wardrobes, and the first one is versatility. Black goes with everything, right? So if you only buy black pants or blue jeans, you think you'll end up with a versatile wardrobe. And to an extent, yes, I. But not every color goes best with black. But also what you're gaining in versatility, you're losing in style. By far, though, the biggest reason I think women don't use more color in their wardrobes is that we're just afraid of looking silly. We're afraid of looking too bold or outlandish, and we're afraid of doing it wrong. These are not insurmountable obstacles. Pairing colors together does not have to be an unknowable thing that you can't do. And by learning how to pair colors together, you can feel more confident and break out of the black pants and a colorful top rut that so many women find themselves in. Now, if you're giving yourself a little pat on the back because you don't do Black pants. You do dark gray pants and a colorful top. I guess you get a half a point for that, but not a full point. Okay, before we talk about how these three elements of color apply to putting colors together together in your outfits, let's talk about four color formulas that start to take the guesswork out of using more color. And this is in the order of difficulty. You ready? First, neutral plus a color. You've been doing this for as long as you can remember, so we're not going to spend time on it. But I will say, if you are super afraid of color and pairing colors, the best way to take a tiny baby step is, is to just use other neutrals. This is where you gray girls get half a point. You can use gray, navy, brown, tan, ivory, go crazy, girl. Do white. Right. Depending on where you're starting from, this will feel like a big step, but I promise you it'll be okay. All neutrals kind of work the same. Or you can try neutrals on the top and color on the bottom, which will shake things up even more. A little bonus to this one, though, is that you will then have some color on the bottom to make outfits with. A lot of women can't even experiment with color pairing because they only have color in the top half of their wardrobes. The next one is monochromatic, which is wearing the same color or different shades of the same color together. So it could be burgundy and burgundy, or it could be burgundy with light pink. I have been talking about monochromatic looks for at least two years about how on trend they are, and this one is a super easy way to get more comfortable with color, because you can buy a lot of monochromatic sets right now, which just takes all the guesswork out of it. And even if you're not buying sets, one of my favorite tricks is to search by the name of a color if I'm on the store's website and see all the pieces that that color comes in. So if you're on j. Crewfactory.com, for example, and you are looking at my beloved antique navy, you can find it in tees and sweaters. But you can also find it in skirts and pants, which makes it very easy to put a true monochromatic outfit together. It doesn't have to be that perfect and matchy matchy, though. That's just a quick, easy tip, something that I like to do. All right. The third color formula is analogous, which is colors next to each other on the color wheel, like blue and green or red and orange. Analogous color Schemes usually include three colors that are next to each other, but if you're baby stepping it, go ahead and just use two. It's fine. I don't really have a hack for this one, but this is a time where a color wheel or a picture of a color wheel on your phone is super duper handy. Just pull an item from your closet, find it on the color wheel, and then look to the left of it or to the right and find that color pretty simple. Finally, number four, the trickiest of all is complementary, which is colors that are opposite from each other on the color wheel. This one is tricky because complementary colors are meant to be bold. Think of all the sports teams or logos that use this formula, like purple and yellow, blue and orange, red and green. They are meant to be high impact. They they choose these to stand out. So if you don't want to stand out, do this one carefully or use one color in a dominant way in the outfit and then the other as a small accent. Now, that is not all the color formulas that are out there, but it's enough to get you started. Those are sort of the four easiest ones. So let's move on to those three elements, talking about how they work together in outfits, starting with temperature. Again, warm versus cool colors, warm versus cool undertones. A lot of conventional wisdom says that warm and cool colors don't work well together, but honestly, I don't agree. Some of my favorite color combinations are a mix of warm and cool that don't work under that rule, but actually look fantastic together, like ivory and gray. It's probably my favorite olive and lavender. Another favorite, mauve and mustard yellow. The trick is, again, it's not just about temperature, but there needs to be cohesion somewhere in the outfit, whether that's through value or saturation. Another important characteristic of combining temperatures is the ratio. If Your outfit is 50% warm colors and 50% cool, the temperature contrast can be highlighted and it can be a little bit stark and jarring. But using one temperature in that dominant way and the other one as an accent can create that interesting color contrast that then feels balanced. The second element, if you remember, is value. The biggest way value comes into play in your outfits is the level of contrast. And this is the difference between how light and how dark the pieces of your outfits are. This one bridges colors that look good on you and colors that look good together. Some women look better in high contrast outfits like black pants and a white top, while others look better in low contrast outfits like light gray pants and an ivory top. And how can you tell what looks best on you? It's based on your level of contrast. This is what colors look good on you, right? So, for example, I have low contrast. I have light hair, light eyes, light skin. I'm kind of one color. High contrast outfits overwhelm me. On the other hand, a woman with high contrast coloring, like really dark hair, light skin, vivid eyes, she might look a little bit dull in the low contrast outfits that are best for me, when it comes to contrast, your choices are a spectrum because your natural contrast is a spectrum. But just start with these three high contrast. This would be black pants and a white top, medium contrast black pants and a medium blue top, or low contrast black pants and a burgundy top. Now, is it a style deal breaker if you don't match your contrast level perfectly to your outfit's contrast level? No, not at all. But there is a style magic that happens when you do Pay attention to women who look just like chic and polished and expensive and see if their outfit contrast matches their natural contrast. I think you might be surprised. But I think what happens a lot is, is that we just default to medium contrast with the black pants and colorful top formula that a lot of us just do, whether we plan on it or not. This is great if you have medium contrast, but if you don't, there definitely are better options. The final element is saturation, or how clear or muted the colors are. And just like colors looking good on you, this plays a huge and usually overlooked role in, in how colors look together in your outfit. The simplest formula is to pair clear with clear and muted with muted. But that can leave bright outfits feeling just a little bit too bright, a little bit, I don't know, too bold, too clownish. And it can leave muted outfits feeling just a little too dull or drab or lackluster. This is a really good time to use that dominant and accent ratio. So if your outfit is mostly bright, add in something muted for balance or vice versa. Also, when you're mixing saturations, keep one other color element cohesive. So also keep one other color element cohesive. So you can mix saturations, but keep the temperature the same. For example, here's what I want you to take away from how the three elements of color impact the way colors work in your outfits. It's okay to mix elements like warm and cool colors or different saturations, but there needs to be similarity between at least one element. Without it, your color pairing will just look off. And then instead of feeling like color is a tool that you can Play with to have better style, you're going to feel like you're stuck in black pants purgatory forever. And I want you to feel like you've got options and know how to put outfits together that look like you did it on purpose. Before we get to the homework, let's just quickly recap what we covered today. Color works in two ways. In your wardrobe, choosing colors that look best on you and putting colors together in your outfits. Every color has three elements. Temperature, warm versus cool value, light versus dark, and saturation, bright versus muted. All three matter, not just temperature. When choosing colors for yourself, if a color doesn't work, ask which element is off? Is it the wrong temperature? Is it too light, too dark, too bright, too muted? When putting colors together in outfits, you can use any of those four formulas that we talked about to get started. You can do neutral plus color, monochromatic, analogous or complementary. Temperature, value, and saturation all affect how the colors work together. And remember, these have a compound effect. One element being off or different might be fine, but multiple mismatches is when things don't look right. There needs to be that cohesive thread running through the whole outfit to connect the dots. There is obviously a whole lot more we could say about color. As I started putting this episode together, I was like, dang, we could do a season about this. It is a big topic, but just understanding these three elements and how they work together and is the groundwork for feeling more confident to even try with color. And that allows you to practice which, surprise, surprise, is how you get really good at it. So here's your homework. I want to challenge you this week to just start noticing and naming these three elements. Go to any website, go to J. Crew, go to Anthropologie, go anywhere and just scroll and look for warm colors and cool colors. Just identify them. Look for high contrast and low contrast outfits. Look for bright versus muted colors. Identifying these elements when you don't have the pressure of trying to get dressed will make it easier to use them when you actually are. One thing I like to do is pay attention to what people are wearing when I watch TV or scroll through social media. Just start to look at people and colors and what they're wearing and just identify the elements. If you're feeling extra and you want to do a little more, try one new color pairing this week. It doesn't mean that you have to ditch all the beloved neutrals, but challenge yourself to work two non neutrals into an outfit somehow. And it can be that that dominant color, an accent. You can just throw a scarf on, some colorful shoes, whatever. Just try. I really hope that this episode encourages you to think about color beyond just what should you wear near your face? And instead use it to create cohesive, interesting outfits that make you look and feel fantastic. That's all for this episode of the Everyday Style School. Thank you for spending time with me today. If you're ready to make style easier and more fun, you come join me in the Style Circle. It's where you'll get all of our classes, capsule guides, and style tools, plus the support to actually use them. You can become a member today at your Everyday style dot com. I will see you next time, and until then, stay stylish.