The old saying about diamonds is better applied to lipsticks – as being a woman’s best friend. Without which no makeup is complete. It is what finishes off a stunning look or even with a nude colour gives a perfect no makeup look. But so many of us still get it wrong. Unfortunately while we may be able to carry off the latest purple or blue hue in our 20s. It becomes much more difficult after that unless its Halloween! Luckily enough this multi-billion business has colours for all of us. There are a couple of steps to selecting the right tone for you. Complexion, skin tone as well as its undertone are important factors.
Dark shades will make your lips look smaller, while lighter shades can add plumpness.
1.Skin Complexion
Examine your skin under natural lighting to determine your complexion: fair, light, medium, olive, or dark.
- Fair skin: your skin is very pale or translucent and you burn very easily. You will go very red in the sun. Go for cool lipstick colours in particular light pink, corals, peach, and nudes.
- Light skin: your skin is pale. When you are in the sun you burn and then over time tan. Go for cool lipstick colours especially light browns, peaches and nudes.
- Medium: you tan easily and generally don’t burn. Go for neutral colours – but you can probably wear colours that go with either skin colour. Mauves and roses as well as berry shades will look good.
- Olive: You rarely burn and look tanned even in the winter. Go for warm lipstick colours. Go for colours with orange undertones, especially corals and deep pinks.
- Deep: your skin is dark and you never get sunburned. Go for warm lipstick colours ruby and wine colours will look especially good.
For everyday use – go for a lip colour that is a couple of shades darker than your natural lip colour.
2. Determine Your Skin Undertone
Your skin tone can be pink, yellow or both. Pink undertone is cooler; yellow is warmer and pink-yellow is neutral. A simpler way to determine your undertone is to look at your veins of your wrist; if they are blue you have cool undertone and if they are green then your undertone is warm and if the veins appear bluish-green or greenish-blue then you are the blessed owner of neutral undertones.
3. Match Color with your Skin tone
You should always try to match the lipstick for your skin tone; those having warm tones should look for warm colors and those with cool skin should settle on cool shades. It is recommended to stay away from colors having ash gray or pale tint in them as they’ll make your skin look pale and unhealthy.
Matte lipsticks make lips to look thinner, while glossy and shimmery shades lipsticks can make them look fuller.
- Olive skin tone
Being neutral olive- from medium to light olive– skin tone looks best with almost any lipcolor. Think about putting on nude orange pink or red shades or match the lipstick for your skin tone.
- Fair skin Tone
The fair skinned girls are lucky ones as they can play with bold and bright hues like reds; pinks, plums etc and may look fantastic on them. However you should stay away from too light shades as well as those with yellow undertones so as to avoid a washed out look.
- Dark skin Tone
When you have dark skin you can never go wrong on deeper tints like deep plum; reds, and berries etc. But it is highly recommended to avoid too light or pale shades unless you aim at a retro look.
These are general guidelines. But try on all colours you fancy for the heck of it and don’t conform to the rules.