Jocelyn Is A Bright Winter
February 13, 2010 by Christine Scaman · 8 Comments
Jocelyn and I work together. Since we work with animals, all I see her in is surgical scrubs. I knew 4 things before we began:
- I have never seen her in a colour that she doesn’t completely dominate, with the exception of dark charcoal.
- Black (and cool colours in general) clear her skin.
- She can wear light colours as well as dark.
- There is great contrast (very light lights and very dark darks) in her colouring.
I try like h.ll to let the drapes guide the Personal Colour Analysis (PCA), and avoid all foregone conclusions. When I see someone every day, and the effects are this dramatic, I can’t help but have suspicions. What did I suspect?
- Her best colours would be very dark and/or very saturated. (see What Are Clear And Soft Colours? for an explanation of saturation.)
- There is great potential for clarity in her skin. Warm colours make her skin blotchy, heavy, green-yellow, murky, and thick-looking. Softly greyed colours (pastels) give the skin an allover-grey undertone. It’s Winter and Spring that have the clear colours.
- Dark Autumn and Dark Winter have some light colours, but not many. They just look better in darker colours. Joce looks fresh and beautiful in the right light colour.
- We’re probably looking for a Season of contrast, namely a Winter of some sort.
The expression “clears the skin” is confusing. It’s very hard to demonstrate but extremely important in interpreting ultimate skin perfection. You met Joce in the previous article, Clearing Skin With Colour Analysis and can watch this process on video there.
Joce has a strong natural flush in her cheeks. Isn’t “ruddy” a sign of Autumn? I’ve seen in Autumns, Winters, Springs, and Summers. Not useful information. Ignore it. On Joce, the redness in the cheeks blends back softly into her complexion only in Bright Winter’s colour intensity.
The boobytrap of matching brown eyes to brown (Autumn) drapes is waiting in ambush here. Yes, there was a connection between the two. Skin always takes precedence, and Autumn colours are easily Joce’s worst shades. All too easy to put brown eyeshadow on these eyes. Most shades of brown did not help this skin. Why then paint them on her face? True to her personal colour palette, her cosmetic colour was a blackened brown liner, and it meshed perfectly with her face. On a blue-eyed person, we would have used charcoal or deep sapphire.
She doesn’t have dark hair or the cliché “clear eyes”. Her hair is medium brown, but there are no orange tones in it, and very few yellow (she’s growing out some yellow dye at the moment). Have you ever in your life seen eyes like this? I promise you I did not adjust anything in this image other than to raise the exposure and sharpness 2 notches. And this is without mascara!!
As a Bright Winter, Jocelyn is primarily a Winter person, but she has a trace of Spring. When you combine the 2 Seasons of highest colour saturation, the energy of these colours in unwearable by anyone else. They will disappear inside such colour intensity, and therefore appear reduced. Never let your clothing send a message that diminishes you – or at least, don’t put down money for it!
This video shows the final draping process.
If your browser won’t play it here, watch it on YouTube at 12 Blueprints Personal Colour Analysis Bright Winter Final Drapes.
I’ve been asked why she’s wearing so much makeup in the video. For several reasons:
- I was taking photos as well as video and have learned that too little makeup is invisible in photos.
- I don’t try hard to match foundation, others can do that better than I – though you WILL finally know what your undertones are, unknowable without a PCA. I want you to see what your makeup colours look like, as your eye starts to learn this. I apply the makeup colours pretty heavily and I don’t blend. I want you to see how forgiving right makeup is and how it can dramatically heighten the magic in your natural colouring.
- Bright Winter is a Season of all-out glamour, like no other group. Just as they can carry unbelievably shocking colour intensity, so can they wear striking makeup.
Most importantly, I want you to stretch your preconceived limits of what is possible. I want you to start replacing the old pictures of yourself in your head.
How The 5 Autumns Add Brown To Hair Colour
February 3, 2010 by Christine Scaman · 8 Comments
Pardon, but what 5 Autumns?
Well, in Seasonal Colour Analysis, there’s Soft, True, and Dark.
But Autumn’s blends include Soft Summer and Dark Winter too.
Only 1 True Season, and 4 Neutral Seasons all comprise some Autumn colour influence.
Autumn’s biggest misconception is the copper red hair. Usually, these people have brown hair.
The Autumn=copper association is often extended to include clothing colours, skin undertones, and makeup colours.
In fact, the shade of brown used to warm Autumn colours doesn’t attain copper’s heat till you’re way into the middle of the Autumn action.
Let’s start at True Summer. No orange. No gold. No yellow. The brown is grey and the grey is blueish.
As Autumn starts phasing in, we move to Soft Summer. A little brown is being added. A neutral brown, not orange yet, not even amber. The blue undertone is taken out. The colours appear to have a faint tan.
Soft Autumn comes along next. We see a soft amber brown. Yellows re-emerge, where True Summer barely had any, and they are golden as an amber-brown patina lays over all the colours of this palette. This is the beginning of the metallic quality we talk about in the skin and hair of Autumn people. It’s hard to describe. It doesn’t look like a tan, it’s much more in the skin than on it.
Finally, True Autumn. NOW the undercurrent is truly orange. Not before. Brown, remember, is just dark orange. This is an orangey brown. It is in the skin. It is also in the eye colour.
Up to Dark Autumn, a trace of Winter is felt. Winter’s colours are cooler and bring in red, the essential colour of the Winter group. The result is the red-orange undertone that defines the perfect disappearing blush and lipstick on Dark Autumn. Colour Analysis is all about cosmetic colours custom-coloured for your skin.
Since Winter is dark, we must add another Winter effect for Dark Winter : the addition of perceptible black. What orange remains is turning neutral brown again, like it was in Soft Summer, but a darker version caused by the black.
Now, we leave Autumn altogether and it’s True Winter. Orange is gone again.
Watch me do it.
Be careful.
Soft Summer’s hair is almost always too light and too highlighted with a colour that’s too yellow. At first glance, they seem like light people and it looks ok. The Colour Analysis drapes soon show us how aging the light hair is for the skin tone. Once it’s corrected, it is much better.
A Soft Autumn can too easily be put in too red hair. It is overkill every time. Unless Nature gave you red, it is VERY hard to get right from a bottle. Like thinking a bottle can replicate your childhood colour. Won’t happen. This is light tawny hair.
True Autumn in light tawny hair looks F-L-A-T. And instantly 10 years older. They need warmth and rich colour. They do not need highlights, lowlights, or other bizarre f/x. The colour should speak for itself.
Dark Autumn often adds a red rinse. You NEED to know if you’re on the warm or cool side of the Season. If the red is too cool, like red wine, it can be very artificial. Artificial works on the staff of the hair salon, not the clients.
Dark Winter should do what all Winters do. Think twice before lightening hair. They can have a dark force that is to be reckoned with. Breaking it up with frosted tips, well… I’d rather have the force. The skin-perfecting hair colour is a dark neutral brown, most of the time.
What’s the hair lesson? Nature will never give you hair colour that is your skin’s perfection. They accord automatically. Your natural colour is always your best base colour.
Elisa Is A True Summer
January 7, 2010 by Christine Scaman · 14 Comments
Elisa has always believed herself to be a Spring. Her freckles, warm brown hair, and natural flush in her skin caused her, and others, to conclude that the colours in her design followed Spring’s colour rules. When assessing a colour, be it in you or outside you, we ask the same 3 questions, because any colour has 3 properties.
Spring colours are all:
Lightness or Darkness? > light, or at least never very dark
Warm or Cool? > warmed, and by yellow NOT orange
Clear or Soft? > clear, or highly saturated, NOT dulled
The premise of Seasonal Colour Analysis is that every colour in your natural colour composition answers those 3 questions in the same way. Your swatch book is a group of colours that fit on those scales in those exact same positions too, thereby replicating the colours in your design. That is how the magic happens.
I can see how one might look at the light-medium warmish brown hair and see warmth, light, and clarity.
Her eyes are not warm though. They are a medium-dark blue-grey.
The dark brows could make Winter cross your mind.
But nevermind the hair and eyes. We established long ago that they are not used in defining the Season, they’ll just lead you astray. We look at skin.
Without a proper analysis, you can’t really understand skin. You have to watch how it reacts to colour. Are freckles not a sign of warmth? No! They’re another red herring, kind of like the “clear eyes” concept. You have to look beyond them, at the skin. So we’re back to Plan A, with how did the draping go?
Both Elisa’s skin and her eye patterns performed precisely as True Summer does. The moonlit, luminous translucency that only True Summer does so well was there for sure. The absolute inability to handle the slightest degree of heat, or it’s instant pasty skin, was there. This skin tone seems to look turquoise in turquoise, and melon in melon.
In fact, Elisa is a study in contrasts. She has warm hair, dark eyebrows, deep blue eyes, and freckles (which feel warm). She could be placed in any number of Seasons, but none would feel right. Once we neutralized all the variables, it was clear that she is a True Summer.
Makeup often seemed too conspicuous so became something to avoid. We looked at how to accentuate her features with the same understated elegance that is true of her entire palette. These are Grace Kelly clothes and colours. This is the skin and eye colour that was made for BlueGrey eyeliner (Annabelle makes a perfect (and perfectly inexpensive) pencil by that name). Everyone can wear makeup beautifully, but the fragility of this skin is easily overwhelmed.
Elisa has some natural shadowing around her eyes. It was least pronounced in the True Summer colours, but wasn’t obliterated altogether. That’s called Photoshop. Many women fight that (and many other “imperfections”) with too much concealer, which ends up looking caked and even more obvious. There is a little foundation here, but no concealer. I usually apply concealer or foundation, but seldom both. Those products are overdone, and take a lot of time. I want to show you how to recognize your cosmetic colours.
Cosmetics counters and makeup artists are usually good at matching foundation. If they won’t allow you to take a few samples home to try in daylight, don’t buy the product. I ask women to bring their foundation to their PCA. So far, none have been wearing the right colour but they knew that already.
In your right colours, you will see the area under the eye become as illuminated as possible. Wear a little makeup, but allow your face. Ignore our magazine-obsessed culture that has us trying to delete our individuality.
One of the biggest misconceptions about True Summer’s colours is that they are all dusty lavender and Wedgewood blue, “old” colours. In fact, the most important feature of True Summer colours is NOT their dustiness, or softness, or grayishness, all the same idea. It is the COOLNESS.
These are not at all confined to being light colours, though Summer is thought of as light. Relative to Winter, it is lighter, but they can do surprisingly dark colour.
In this graphic, the high saturation (hi sat) colours are on the left, as you can see. The lo sat colours are only softer BY COMPARISON. They’re the colour of denim and flower petals. The True Summer personal colour palette contains these same beautiful colours, at about 50% saturation or less.
The hi sat shades on the left are pigment-saturated, pigment-soaked, pigment-logged. Winter needs them and usually doesn’t wear them saturated enough, in part because they’re hard to find except in workout clothing. Few women over 25 feel safe buying these colours.
Elisa is married to the most mannerly man you’ll ever meet. Aggression and confrontation are disturbing to this personality. Hurry and pressure flusters them more than most. It is very calming to this character to be able to depend on certain things, especially decency and kindness. Courtesy is the most essential prerequisite of all.
Emily is a True Winter
December 11, 2009 by Christine Scaman · 3 Comments
Emily has passed the milestones of her first 20 years. The next 20 years will involve marriage, career, and family, often all at once. It’s in these years that women have the least amount of time to spend on themselves, both inside and out. The demands can be overwhelming and once we emerge on the other side, many of us still look like the students we were when we last bought age-appropriate makeup.
Like so many women, in every age group, Emily doesn’t wear makeup. It’s easy to understand. Very few women can accurately choose what cosmetic colours suit them best. Many have tried but the result didn’t speak for them, so they felt like impersonators; or the sales pressure was too intense, and the upsells too mind-boggling, to honestly express uncertainty. We’ve all seen, or been, the woman at the makeup counter looking completely overdone. You can FEEL her thinking “Get me home before someone sees me.”
Emily would like to know what clothes look best and some help choosing makeup that doesn’t make her feel painted. She has the sense and good taste to want to be noticed for the right reasons.
When the colour is wrong, you can never achieve the magic, no matter how lightly or heavily you apply it. When you start hearing “Just apply a thin layer and blot it to a stain”, forget it. If you need all those shenanigans, the colour is wrong and besides, it won’t last 10 minutes. We all know what makeup- sitting-on-top-of-skin looks like. When the colour melds with the skin, you can apply quite a bit before it starts looking fake.
Put a light, wishy-washy colour on a True Winter and unattractive things happen. Their eyes are dull, almost empty. The person so dominates the colour with their inherent colour intensity, that all you see is a face that appears ill. The skin is dull and shadowed. What happens to the skin happens to the whites of the eyes. As they yellow or grey, the crispness of the eye colour is terribly diluted. It makes you FEEL sad to look at that face.
Emily’s colouring is so strong that she wore many of the Bright Winter drapes well, the most brilliant shock colour there is. Bright Winter requires a little heat in the skin, which Em doesn’t have. As a result, the Bright Winter drapes drained the colour from her face and turned her skin grayish, like the walls of the room.
Though I’ve often said eye colour isn’t relevant to Season, I want to clarify that. Any Season can have any eye colour and that remains a fact. But just as the drapes are looking to make a connection with the skin, so are they searching for the like colours in the eyes. They are astonishingly and precisely coloured to A. force a reaction in the skin, and B. to detect an exact colour match in the person’s skin. When the association is made, it’s electrifying. Em has navy blue in her eye. Watch it come out when like colours find one another.
Lessons
1. If you’re not used to lipstick, use sheer colours but stay true to your swatches. The blue-eyed winter with a soft feeling about her may do better in soft fuchsia than red, but too much colour would be outside Em’s comfort zone. We used Cover Girl Amazemint in 615 (Cozy Plum) and it’s lovely.
2. Even young people should use shimmer makeup very carefully, if at all. Even on a young True Winter, it makes Emily’s upper eyelid too prominent. Frost is attention-getting. It says “Lookit me! Lookit me!”. Classy makeup doesn’t do that. It’s your supporting player but it is not YOU. Let your makeup be a diffusion of your own colours floating over your face, but let people look at your eyes because they are the shine in your face.
3. Here is an example of Winter who might deepen her hair to match the brows, but always remaining true to the base shade. Nature will never colour you wrong. Her hair is the right colour but Emily could enhance the dark brows/milk skin effect more by deepening her own shade a touch. It will look real because the brows are dark, but more dramatic (not necessarily better, just a stronger visual effect).
4. This is also a place to think about how bad it looks if a Winter were to lighten her hair. The dark brows become more prominent, and look severe. Severe=aging.
For any Season, even if you don’t do much with your brows, there will be more attention on your eyes than ever before. Finding a stylist who can remove stray hairs without altering the shape to look like Pamela Anderson is good.
5. As a Dark Winter, my eyeliner is browner and lighter (MAC Grey Utility). Em will wear a crisper darker grey (Graphiti). I don’t believe anyone of lighter complexion than Frieda Pinto can wear black eyeliner, certainly not in the daytime. True Winter’s grey consists of black and white. It’s a pure, true grey.
6. You all know I think blue/green/purple on a face that can be seen as a color is a cartoon, right? Don’t ever wear it to a job interview, and only to work if you are an artist of some sort. Estee Lauder Black Plum and Merle Norman Sapphire are examples of colour that doesn’t look like colour. They are less hard than black and the viewer doesn’t strongly perceive purple or blue.
When she saw her pictures, she didn’t recognize herself.
It takes a certain courage to step up to a personal colour analysis. Like having your fortune told, as empowering as it is, you may hear some things you’re not ready for. I’ve been told that I read palms. What I really read is potential. To see yourself as you never have, both inside and out, takes endurance. It also brings the responsibility of answering the question “What are you going to do with it?”
Em will travel her own colour journey. It won’t look like mine or yours or anyone else’s. Some of it may not gel for years. Doesn’t matter. She’s got a lifetime to refine it. She’ll feel confident and beautiful wearing makeup and know that people see the real Emily. It takes more time to convince yourself of all that it can be, and how powerful the final effect is, when every element meshes.
Once you get to the makeup counter and are told that you don’t really need to follow your personal colour swatches, you really have to dig deep and find some fortitude. Why would you NOT use them? Why would the sales assistant NOT use them? If they’ve never had a PCA and watched the process, they don’t understand why you’re holding the book you have, or what the other Books look like. They’re tremendously good at what they do, but colour analyzed skin tone perfection is a key that can only be turned one way.
You have become empowered to know things about your skin and colouring that they simply can’t know. But YOU know. YOU saw it. This is one situation where close enough is NOT good enough.
Dark Autumn Jewelry
November 21, 2009 by Christine Scaman · 6 Comments
As in any of the 12 groups in Seasonal Colour Analysis, the variability is enormous. My Dad is a Dark Autumn. Here we are, the proud parents of our first pie. As a younger man, he appeared to have black hair. It wasn’t black in the sense that Asian people have ink blue-black hair, but it was blacker than the blackest coffee. His eyes are dark hazel. It would have been very easy to confuse him for a Winter, but the sleek shiny Winter look was all off. His character is practical, not emotional or theatrical. Like most Autumns, he had a sense of what suited him, but wore far more brown than anything else.
Halle Berry could be a Dark Autumn, with her bronzed colouring.
My friend Gina is too. Her skin tone has an olive quality and her overall colouring is vivid and dramatic. She has all the fiery sparkle in her character that she has in her appearance.
These are the Autumn individuals who integrate a trace of Winter’s darkness, coolness, and formality. The colours are exotic, spicy, and more warm than cool. They are also dark.
The jewelry is strong and metallic, with heavy touches of copper, gold and bronze. The weight of Autumn jewelry is found but the regal touch of Winter calls for more simplicity, fewer pieces worn at once.
The look is expensive, rare, and precious. The feeling is of age and extreme value, as in heirloom pieces and vintage reproductions. The colours are deeply glowing embers. Just as there is weight and luxury to the fabric that suits Dark Autumn, so is there a strong essence to the jewelry. Flimsy fabrics belong to another Season, as does dainty silver filigree.
Diamond is a classical Winter stone, as might be Ruby and Sapphire, but worn in warm metal settings, they add drama and opulence. The proximity to Winter certainly allows silver settings too, depending on the clothing being worn. Any cut stone in your personal colour palette will be perfect and with the tolerance for warm and cool, there are many to choose from.
The 1928 Jewelry company’s pieces always come to mind. The antique aspect gives the feeling of ancient treasure. The metals are a little darker and more heavily textured than the standard gold strand. The chains and links are usually considerably heavier than the delicate fixtures of most jewelry. The richly luxurious colours lend a precious and ornate feeling. The ambiance is of great wealth, of a library in glowing evening light, burning coals in the fireplace, touches of gold and and deep greens in the room, plush velvet and satin fabrics, and a dark burgundy wine.
With the personal colour palette of fiery, spicy, passionate colour and the unique ability to wear striking and vivid contrast, this group comprises many of the more exotic shades and prints. Far-off spice markets and bazaars are evoked by paprika, cinnabar, and bay leaf. There are numerous lighter shades and neutrals, including black, but the defining terms are darkness and heat. Likewise, unusual and original jewelry looks custom-made and one-of-its-kind, adding to the impression of affluence.
Frivolous effects, casual clothes, and youthful touches are not in keeping with this strong bold energy. This Season delivers a serious visual impact. Clothes and accessories are important, creative pieces. Of course, the size of jewelry is always in keeping with the size of the person wearing it, so the pieces need not be enormous.
These people may be capable, often forceful, organizers and leaders. Potent personalities need to be reflected in an exterior that is equally powerful. Anything soft or moderate just becomes a person wearing someone else’s clothes. The bridge that links the inner to the outer being, and translates into a compelling presence, will not be made.
The target is always to perfectly harmonize your inner core and exterior self. Your skin’s heat, your body size, your personal vitality are all expressions of the same energy form that came together as YOU. Learning to listen to the language of your soul creates a visual communication that just feels so right.
Louise and Stevan Are Light Springs
November 11, 2009 by Christine Scaman · 6 Comments
Spring personalities were put on Earth to make the rest of us smile. Louise and I work together ( she is a veterinarian too) and I’m grateful for it every day.
Although Louise gets the credit for making me laugh (not easily done), her husband David is a pro photographer. He took this picture as well as the breathtaking pictures of Louise that follow.
A quintessential Spring, Louise can talk about any topic under the sun. She is always open and friendly, assertive, sincere, optimistic, and FUNNY. As she says “If you can’t look on the bright side, what’s the point?” Louise says what comes into her head. She is spontaneous, not careful or rehearsed. She is not withdrawn. On Take-Your-Child-To-Work Day, my kids want to be with Louise for the day, not their serious, business-like mother.
As always, colours repeat not just how you look but your personality. These are ice cream dessert colours. They’re happy and impulsive.
These clothes are certainly not menswear tailored, but neither are they always flouncy. They may be sporty but they are mostly about movement. The relaxed, informal personality looks natural in jeans and comfortable textures. With the Summer feminine blend and the light delicacy of the colouring, this could be an ultra-feminine person, but Louise is the easy and casual type.
Many Springs are fascinated by the natural world. They jumped in the puddles as children, not over them. Louise is never happier than in her garden. She looks great in beautifully coloured fleece. If she chooses, she can look very feminine, but she does not carry dark/serious/formal so well.
You might look at Louise’s hair colour, see the medium ash brown (it is more ash IRL) , and say 2 things:
- She’s too dark to be a light season >> Remember, hair colour is irrelevant. It is hidden during the analysis so that we don’t make this exact mistake. Hair colour can be anything. We are only concerned with perfecting the skin.
- Her hair is too cool; Springs have golden hair >> She certainly is closer to her cool neighbor on the Summer side, but her skin perfection colours are more yellow. This is the Summery version of this season. Not everyone falls precisely into their season. They may be closer to one neighbor or the other.
What does it look like when the person veers on the warmer side of this season, moving very close to True Spring. Meet Stevan. His colours are still light and he and Louise share the same personal colour palette. He is as handsome, sunlit, and friendly as he appears in this picture. Stevan smiles easily and is genuinely interested in others, the hallmark of a Spring. His hair is as golden as his skin tone and his character. (Before anyone asks, Stevan is the bigger one, but that so-cute baby has golden potential.)
I’m such a fan of nature’s contrasts. When cool hair is paired with warmer skin, as you see with Louise, or the reverse combination we saw in Pam Is A Dark Winter, these are striking to look at. The one is a showcase for the other. It is especially important to understand your coloring if this is your blueprint because sales people will (inadvertently) match clothing to the degree of warmth/coolness they see in hair and eyes. They have little choice. Without personal colour analysis, it is impossible to understand the precise degree of warmth/coolness of skin tone.
Pam really has to stick to her guns when someone tells her to wear warm lipcolour or add copper highlights. Her skin is mostly cool so her makeup and clothes are mostly cool. She knows her cosmetic colours from her swatches. Louise has to insist on apricot, salmon, and warm pink when someone tries to sell her fuchsia. Her Spring colouring dictates that she must avoid dusty, grayish colours at all costs. She looks for CLEAR and LIGHT, but as the cooler example of her season, it’s a pink-salmon rather than a coral-salmon.
However, in her hair colour, her highlights will only be barely yellow, not too golden, respecting the summer coolness of her natural colour. Stay with the contrast you were born with and heighten its elements. If Stevan were to highlight his hair, he would use a much more yellow colour than Louise, respecting the clear, pale golden warmth of his natural colour.
Can she wear black? No. She looks sad and severe. As you know from Wrong Colours Away From The Face, I believe you look most connected when your darkest colour (especially for big items like coats, pants, and shoes) is no darker than your darkest hair tone. There’s altogether too much black out there anyhow. It’s an evasion for not knowing what to really wear. Though a light season, Louise has a deep emerald turquoise, a Chinese blue, a gorgeous violet. They are not oppressive. They are sophisticated with the incredible neutrals of champagne, cameo, and seashell.
Colour conveys feeling in subliminal ways. It speaks of imagination and youth. It also conveys hot-ness. It can be done the cheap way, but that’s another evasion. Why not do look expensive? Why not look like this?
When the colours you WEAR, repeat the colours you ARE, you have a secret weapon.
True Autumn Jewelry
November 7, 2009 by Christine Scaman · 6 Comments
You’ve arrived early for the party. You take a look around at who’s already there. Immediately, your eye is drawn to the two women talking on the couch.
One is sitting quietly, straight back even though it’s a slouchy couch, laughing but not letting loose. She’ll probably sit there all night because she doesn’t like circulating and making small talk. She feels self-conscious about how to interrupt conversations. Of course, she’s all in black. Not the most imaginative colour but it undeniably suits her. She’s wearing one solid piece of jewelry.
Her friend is doing an imitation of somebody. She’s laughing freely and gesturing more freely. She’s watching people coming in. She seems able to talk to three people at once. Her outfit is a riot of wavy lines but it was made for her. It’s a batik handpainted print with a beaded fringe. The waves appear in motion as she moves. The fabric is satiny and catches every ray of light. Her bracelet is so full of life that it would be too much costume on anyone else. On her, it looks beautiful with her golden skin. It is joyful and almost mischievous.
You move into the kitchen. The woman slicing vegetables for the platter commands attention. For one thing, she doesn’t care if you’re a guest, you’re given the job of refilling drinks. She’s directing traffic so the meal gets done on time and to her satisfaction. Her energy is highly organized as she orchestrates this evening.
You wonder if she has some Meditteranean ethnicity. Her skin is lightly freckled, but she seems to belong in the sun and to reflect its heat from her deepest core. Her cheekbones and jaw are equally strong. She wears little makeup, just a sheer bittersweet red lip colour. Like the colours of her busy and productive kitchen, she is wearing a raw silk blouse in a fabulous paprika colour, with a textured chocolate brown vest over it. Well in tune with her personal colour palette, she has added a fine woolen scarf with a stained-glass design in deep autumn leaf colours. Her pants are slim and straight, not flowing. Her bracelet is lying on the counter.
The piece FEELS just like the woman who wears it. It so belongs on her that you wouldn’t be surprised to see it fly through the air and attach itself to her wrist with an electrically charged attraction. A tapestry of molten colours is reflected from its chunky, squared stones and heavy settings.
The natural stones suit the straightforward character of this woman. They are the colours of a giving Earth. This is not September, with its lingering remnant of Summer. Neither is it November where the freeze is setting in. Colour is powerfully connected to how the Earth FEELS at certain times. This is a rich harvest, a comfortable welcome, a safe, steady place.
Seasonal colour analysis is very much about personality, about reflecting the inside on the outside. If the colour feeling you show is not the colour feeling you are, your appearance feels disorganized and random. This woman never pretends. She won’t say something just to flatter you unless she believes it to be true. She cries harder than anyone at a funeral. She is fiercely loyal to her family but will not spare them hard work or spoil them with extravagance. She may seem to absorb a lot of demands but when she draws the line at enough, everyone knows it.
She has a great sense of what suits her and combines jewelry and accessories in creative, individual ways. She wears 2 rings, her solid, wide, gold wedding band and a topaz stone in a solid gold setting. Her necklace is simple, heavy links of chain in a textured bronze. Their shape is squared, which seems to repeat the squareness of her jaw.
Her entire look FEELS rich but unpretentious, busy but approachable, and glowing but natural. She can wear a lot of metal at once and it works. Her hair is coloured to look metallic, with a dark copper shimmer on a warm, but not very dark, chocolate base. When she wears makeup, she chooses lip and cheek colours with a gleaming shine. By candlelight, even her skin seems burnished.
Her 2 daughters are both Autumn blends, not their mother’s True Season. They try to borrow their mother’s pieces but the energy doesn’t work. Why do so many of those pieces, like this bracelet, look clunky on the lighter daughter and completely meh on the darker one?
When the meal is done, she’ll be in the kitchen washing dishes, unless her considerate Summer husband beats her to it, which he usually does.
Testimonials
November 2, 2009 by Christine Scaman · Leave a Comment
A professional appearance is key in the sales industry. Personal Colour Analysis showed me first hand how various colours & shades can make a significant difference on each individual person. Thank you for teaching me to wear the colours that compliment me best… this leads to great first impressions, both at work and play! Stevan, Ontario.
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I can’t believe what a difference having makeup in the right colours makes. Even after a 70 hour work week last week, I looked well put together. I feel like I look more sophisticated and professional. I look like me-but more so! Christine, I can’t thank you enough for doing such a thorough analysis. This is not the old fashioned “oh, you’re an autumn”. The way you looked at how my eyes changed and the tone of my skin with different colours was amazing to watch. Your careful, scientific approach was very impressive. You really cared that I had the most flattering palette for my skin. I also want to express my appreciation for your help with my hair colour. Several people noticed how nice my hair looked (but they couldn’t quite figure out why). Every woman who wants to look her best should have this done. It has really boosted my confidence in myself. Tracy, British Columbia.
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The Season Guide that you sent me is great. It is nice to know that there is a colour analysis system that is so comprehensive and that recognizes the fact that there is so much variation in human colouring. I have recommended you to my friends. Jelena, Ontario.
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I hate shopping, primarily because there is too much choice and it boggles my mind. Having the little color book with me is great because it is like I have a personal stylist in my pocket. I whip it out wherever I am and I know that if the color matches, I am safe to buy the item. I actually get compliments on my color choices now.
It also allows me to reduce the amount of clothes in the store that I have to consider. I bypass entire sections if the color is not one of mine and so I can narrow the field. This helps me shop. Plus, of course, I feel more confident knowing that I will look good. Now, if you could only make me thinner! Sonja, British Columbia.
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Having the colour analysis done was so informative and fun. It was interesting have the various coloured drapes placed around me. There were many colours I liked and thought I could wear but realized through Christine’s analysis that I shouldn’t. The biggest surprise to me was realizing my hair colour was much too dark for my colouring. I only saw that when Christine took the grey cap off my hair at the end of our session. I immediately saw how my dark hair colour made me look tired and older. I use my booklet of colours all the time when I am shopping. I just keep it in my purse. Holly, Prince Edward Island.
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I haven’t felt this good in years. I feel I have something to work towards. Nathalie, Ontario.
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I’ve got to tell you, that my clothes have taken on a whole new dimension of colour.
I was so stuck on “black”, and it isn’t even my colour. I went to Montreal for my holidays this fall, and decided to spend an entire day going through 3 Value Villages. They hang all their clothing by size and colour, so I went down the isles and only looked at clothes in the colour of the swatches. Perfect, I bought 40 pieces that day, and once washed, they become my own. I have received many compliments on them.
But what was most drastic was changing the colour of my hair. For the last 20 years, I have had “highlights”, you told me that the hair doesn’t need to be that busy, just go with “ash brown”, well this time around I feel the brown was too dark, but boy, did it get alot of attention. On the first week alone, over 30 people made comments. One even said, it made me look 20 years younger, (what age did she think I was before???). Your consultation has made my shopping even more interesting, to scarfs, purses and jewelry.
Thank you so much. Diane, Ontario.
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While I had suspicions that I was a certain Season, NOTHING beats the experience of being draped. The immediate transformation as each drape is applied –as part of specific sequence, heightened by contrast–is a revelation. Elizabeth, West Virginia, USA
Sonja is a Light Summer
November 1, 2009 by Christine Scaman · 5 Comments
Many of you know my sister, Sonja, from A Greener Tea. Sonja could never find the common thread between the colours that look best on her. Cool and warm colours both worked sometimes. In certain deep blues, she wasn’t sure. She hasn’t the time or the interest to invest in worrying about her appearance too much. She doesn’t wear makeup and probably never will.
Clothes that don’t speak the truth about us cost as much as clothes that do. When we communicate accurately about ourselves, it feels surprisingly peaceful. As a PCA progresses, when we begin to identify the perfect colours, there are two expressions that consistently come into people’s eyes. One is ease, a complete absence of tension. The other is humour. The eyes look quietly joyful. In men, I see either this inner satisfaction come out, or a more um, predatory ?, outward expression of “How YOU doin’?”
Summer with a hint of Spring
Within the first 5 drapes, we had established that any dark colour, warm, cool, soft, clear, didn’t matter – all of them were not flattering. Sonja disappeared. All your eyes could see was the overpoweringly dark drape. Her skin had virtually no colour. It could not compete with the drape. The overall effect was of aging, fatigue, and a weak presence.
We found her skin to be predominantly cool, but needing a little pale yellow light to be well balanced. The Light Summer was right. In 12 Season colour analysis, this is one of the neutral seasons, blending a trace of Spring with the Summer base. This is a surprisingly different palette from True Summer, given that the seasons are neighbours.Just as their colours are very different, so are their energies. True Summer is Light Summer’s next cooler neighbor. These are the Grace Kellys and Linda Evans of the world. True Summer is refined, conservative, mannerly, sophisticated.
These are more cheerful, energetic colours, but it’s no spice market. These are more like popsicle colours. There are warmer and cooler options, but none of the colours ever gets extremely dark. They are the June Garden Party colours. The summer holiday.
Think of Princess Diana. A sunnier, more activated personality, but proper nonetheless. Where the True Summer’s energy is in feminine details, sheer fabric, lace, and pearls, the Light Summer is sportier. She can still be relied on to behave and contain her reactions. Her soothing voice, understanding manner, and unfailingly decent conduct may cause her to be the sounding board for many a rant and rave that she did nothing to incite.
These colours do not compete with who Sonja is. She looks relaxed and calm wearing these tones. If she wanted to wear makeup, she wouldn’t need much. These women often shy away from makeup because they’ve been put in colours that are too bright. Someone got the idea that a “pop of colour” would liven them up. There are no pops of colour in their natural blueprint, so painting one on their face feels ridiculous. They’ve been put in eyeshadows that are too earthy, eyeliners that are too dark, and blush that feels silly. They need LIGHT fresh cool colours, halfway between soft and clear, with a little pale yellow sunlight.
Hair
Everyone wants to be a blonde or have blonde highlights. Fully 75% of those highlights were put on heads that should never have them. Light Summer women actually look great as long as it’s not overdone. The colour is like this child’s. The base colour shows through, because a whole head of blonde looks completely flat. The highlight is a cool beige, not very yellow at all.
Sonja adds streaks to her light ash brown hair. She knows that she can go very light, to a light creamy beige. When it shines, it looks almost silvery, very good with the cool skin. A common mistake for these women is to have golden highlights. The yellow in the hair doesn’t calm the skin. It fights with it. It flushes the nose with red. Unless Mother Nature gave you that colouring, don’t try to work gold from a bottle. There is no gold in your Colours Book, so don’t wear a hat hair in that colour.
In Sonja’s Words
I hate shopping, primarily because there is too much choice and it boggles my mind. Having the little color book with me is great because it is like I have a personal stylist in my pocket. I whip it out wherever I am and I know that if the color matches, I am safe to buy the item. I actually get compliments on my color choices now.
It also allows me to reduce the amount of clothes in the store that I have to consider. I bypass entire sections if the color is not one of mine and so I can narrow the field. This helps me shop.
Plus, of course, I feel more confident knowing that I will look good. Now, if you could only make me thinner!
The Colour Analysis. What Happens? What Do You Get?
September 22, 2009 by Christine Scaman · Leave a Comment
Qualms
The idea of having your colours analyzed sometimes meets with fair skepticism. I get that. First, you’re wondering if it’s a gimmick and whether you’ll just end up wasting money. It didn’t work overly well in the 1980s. What makes 2010 so different? (That question, and many others, is answered in PCA FAQs.)
The possibility that a change might be asked of you also creates a little hesitation. I get that too. Your suspicions are correct. Change (is Progress a better word?) will be asked but you can choose to make it as big or small as you are ready for.
Another source of doubt comes from the uncertainty about what actually happens. This is especially so among those who too young to remember the last big wave back of 4 Season Colour Analysis in the 80s.
Back then, more women figured out their season from a book than from an actual draping, so the whole notion of the drapes is quite foreign. The process has been refined to make it far more scientific and extremely accurate. The advent of better colour pigments and reproduction processes produces a swatch book that is light years ahead of what it used to be.
This is what happens.
You are in a grey room. You wear a grey cape like a hairstylist’s cape. I wear a grey coat. Your hair is hidden by a grey hat. I prefer to hide my hair as well. I like there to be nothing going on in the room colour-wise except the drapes and the reaction they provoke in your skin.
Your face is lit by lamps like those in a photographer’s studio. They emit a full-spectrum light, meaning that they render every wavelength (colour) of light accurately. The overhead lights are turned off.
And away we go.
It begins with coloured boards over which we float your hand. It allows people to start looking at how skin responds to colour. I’ve had women pull their hand away like it was burned when the colour of the board was changed. What they saw was their hand age 20 years before their eyes.
Then it’s on to the drapes. The drapes are the size of big bath towels and we lay them across your chest. It takes time to see how each person’s features will respond. Will they toggle between old/young, oily/glowing, rough skin/smooth skin when the colour is changed from bad to good? Or will it be something else on your face?
(The colour reproduction has been altered in these photographs.)
There are 21 sets of drapes used for the analysis, and each set might have 3 to 5 individual drapes in it. We would normally use about 12-15 of the 21 sets to arrive at the final answer.
We spend a lot of time at the beginning deciding whether you might fit into one of the 4 True Seasons. We move through a precise system of drape colours and see the response in your skin.
Reactions
I have had people who feel wrong colours to the point of feeling nauseated and asking me to change them quickly. For them, as for me, colour is something they FEEL. Some people see no reaction in their skin whatsoever.
I’ve had women in whose skin I could see little reaction. They make me nervous. I’ve learned to keep going. The drapes will tell me if I’m patient.
Some find the process hypnotic and fall asleep, like a moving meditation. Others provide huge feedback and see the reaction before I describe it.
Some disagree with me. Most don’t. Good thing. I’ve learned to trust myself.
Some people are so clearly of one Season that they’re easily analyzed. Some straddle two neighboring Seasons so evenly that I have to work harder to decide which side of the border they fall on.
Target
What we’re really trying to do is determine what the colours that look most perfecting on your skin tone have in common. They will compose your personal colour palette. Are they light? How light? Are they light and dusty? Or dark and dusty? Or medium in light/dark, medium in clear/soft, and medium in warm/cool? For instance, you could call these pictured below Light and Cool-ish and Clear-ish.
Once we have you pegged to a perfect season, we move on to a different set of drapes. Known as the Masterpiece collection, these are 15 drapes (12 different sets, so one for each season) of your most gorgeous colours and your most stunning fabrics.
I tell people not to look at the drapes. Look at your skin. The first time people see the colours, they can’t help but look at them. Yes, they are very beautiful, but very importantly, people FEEL a sense of recognition or familiarity, of having been truly seen.
We end up looking at the Masterpiece drapes about 5 times. The first time, you look at the colours. The next time, look at your skin. The third time, think about becoming acquainted with those shades in stores, and appreciating how they make your face look. You will learn to recognize the effect in dressing room mirrors even if you’re not sure about the colours themselves. That takes time.
We let your hair out of the hat and look again. If the beautiful skin effect is lost, then your hair colour is wrong.
We put on makeup for No. 5. Even if you don’t wear makeup, it’s worth doing this. Colour-analyzed cosmetic colour ratchets the whole transformation up that much higher.
Aspiration
You will see yourself as you never have before. You will see yourself as you could be, every day.
Result
Or, What Do You Have When You’re Done?
You have
- the knowledge of your position among the 12 Seasons
- a complete understanding of the best shades of every colour that is perfect for you and how to recognize them in clothing and makeup
- a Colours Book of 60 colour swatches, exclusive to your Season only, with which to choose clothes and makeup,
- an 8-10 page PDF document for your Season that describes the particular radiance and edge of that Season, the clothing style that suits you and your colours best, how to choose hair and makeup colours, the pitfalls to watch for, the perfect jewelry, the colour combinations and power look for men, and a segment on personality traits very common to people of this colouring.
- a list of the makeup, including brand name and colour, that you should be wearing in blush, eyeliner, eyeshadow, mascara, lipstick, and lip gloss – to help you get started, as your eye learns to pick the makeup that looks custom-coloured for you
- the revelation of having seen yourself as you never have and the knowledge of what you are supposed to look like – your own easiest, most authentic beauty
- the power of knowing what NOT to buy and which trends to bypass (or how to customize them for you)
- the first step of a journey of self-discovery about who you are, and how to use clothing and makeup to tell the world about the real you. This is the “life-changing experience” people describe about Personal Colour Analysis.
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