Jennifer Mackey-Mary:  Have you ever noticed that one shade of yellow makes you look amazing while another makes you look exhausted—or 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, budgets, and lives, I know great style isn't about following one-size-fits-all advice - it's about learning what works for you.

Today, we’re continuing our season of fundamentals by talking about color. I know that you’re probably 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, but this isn’t that. What we’re going to do today is talk about the basics of color–the reasons some colors look better on you than others, or look better together than others.

I’m guessing a lot of you listening have had a professional color analysis, but if we took away your color card, or your swatch fan, you’d feel stuck. You got the answer to the test, and there’s nothing wrong with that–color can be hard to understand, and some people have a gift for it, so by all means, take the shortcut. But when you have the answers 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, and so we often default to “black pants and a colorful top”, which is fine…but there are so many more options. 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. 

There are a million quizzes to help you find your best colors, or you can use a service like Your Color Guru, who we love, and I’ll put a link in the shownotes with our discount code–again, there is nothing wrong with the shortcut. But you’re 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 how they work when pairing them in outfits. I’m going to share a couple of mistakes or mindset issues I’ve seen women struggle with when it comes to color, and we’ll wrap up with some homework to help you see color differently, which is where it all starts.


Let’s break down color, shall we? Every color–whether we’re 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 acknowledged that this isn’t an in-depth, nuanced discussion of every element. 

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 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. 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 mixed them together in equal parts, that would be a neutral purple.

The second element is value–or simply light vs dark. Like sky blue vs navy blue. You’ve got high value colors–like pastels baby blue, pale pink, soft yellow. Medium value colors, which I like to think of as the 8 count crayon box. Is plain ol red, blue, green. And then there are low value colors, like navy, burgundy, plum. I know high value being light might be confusing, but think of it as a spectrum–with black on the bottom–low, and white on the top-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–which is whether a color is bright, or muted. This is the difference between hot pink vs dusty rose. Instead of adding black or white to the pure color, this one adds grey. So the lightness or darkness doesn’t change–just whether or not it appears bright and clear, or toned down and muted.

I’m going to say something crazy, and tell you that I think saturation is the biggest game changer when it comes to color. When I realized that I need to lead with brighter, clear colors, it got so much easier to find my best colors. And this element is huge when it comes to putting outfits together as well. This is the one women probably think about the least, but I think it should be where you focus first, especially if you struggle to see warm vs cool 


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.

With that said, the first mistake  is writing off entire color families because one shade didn’t work. Like “I can’t wear yellow’. You know, every season, when we release our color palette for the Capsule Guide, we kind of hold our breaths, because we know the first comments will be “I can’t wear yellow” I can’t wear pink… It’s like the 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 and cool pinks–warm browns and cool browns. It’s funny, because if you’ve ever painted a room in your house, you know there are a million shades of each color, and they all have different undertones that change how they look, but when it comes to clothes, we tend to lump them all together. 

We had a style circle member share a photo–I think from the Summer Capsule, and she said, I thought I couldn’t wear yellow, but then I discovered this shade I feel amazing in. I shared the photo on instagram, so you can go back and check it out. It was just finding a different shade of yellow, and all of a sudden, a whole new color 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 skins undertones matter–if you have cool undertones, you probably look best in cool colors, if your skin has warm undertones, warm colors are probably best. But your coloring is an overall visual value between your hair, skin and eyes…often women can’t figure out their skins undertones so they give up…your hair might be easier to identify, or your eyes might give a bigger clue. Don’t get stuck on just your skin. 

The third mistake women make with undertone or temperature is thinking it’s the only element that matters when it comes to how colors look on them. It’s not. At best, it’s one third. So lets talk about the other two

The second element is value–which is how light or 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 pretty easy-you can just look, 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 all shades of navy. J Crew Factory’s antique navy is fabulous. I get compliments every time I wear it. Banana Republic preppy navy is too dark. It just swallows me up. 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–I don’t care what you want to call it–if you want color to be easier, try focusing here first.

This element is about how clear or bright vs how muted or dusty a color is.

I remember a dress I bought after I had my first daughter–you know those post partum days when you feel really great about yourself? Yeah, well, I had to give a presentation in a class I was taking, and had to find something to wear. I found this dress thing to wear with leggings that was really cute, really me, and really forgiving. So i bought it, and wore it for the presentation, and then never pulled it out of my closet again, even though it was not cheap and it should have been greart. But every time I put it on, I feel so drab and washed out, and I couldn’t figure out why. I’d had my colors done, and I knew that a lighter purple was supposed to be good on me, but I just felt terrible in this thing. Years later, I learned about color saturation and a lightbulb went off in my head and I was like “yes, that was it”. This was a very dusty, muted purple, and if I look at my color card now, there is a shade almost identical to it on there, but is a clearer, brighter version, that would have looked so much better.

To me, this is a super easy element to start with if you want to start looking better in the colors you’re wearing. It’s much easier to see muted vs clear colors than warm vs cool or even when dark is too dark. One of our members described muted colors 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 is hilarious, but also accurate. Both of my sisters look better in these dusty colors–they look a little garish in the brights I go for–whereas I look dull and drab in their muted color palette. It makes a big difference.

Here’s what I want you to take away from how the three elements impact the way colors look on you. Your best colors are a combination of the right temperature, the right value, and the right saturation–but it is a spectrum–some colors aren’t noticeably warm, they’re just warmer, same with the other two elements. That’s why 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. There’s a lot of in between that makes identifying the colors tricky. 

Also, Don’t just stop at trying to find your skins’s undertone and giving up when you can’t tell what color your veins are, and don’t write off a color family completely…get the whole picture. And if seeing the undertones in 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’ll be so much closer. 

Let’s move on to how these 3 elements apply to colors in an outfit, and 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, and to be honest, most days me too. It’s 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 1 non neutral into your outfits, there might be an opportunity to add a little more style and interest to your everyday outfits. 

I think there are a couple of big reasons we don’t use more color in our wardrobes–first is the 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, but not every color goes best with black, but also what you’re gaining in versatility, you’re losing in style. 

By far the biggest reason I think women don’t use more color in their wardrobes is we’re afraid of looking silly. We’re afraid of looking too bold, or outlandish, and we’re afraid of doing it wrong. But these are not insurmountable obstacles, and by knowing how to pair colors together, you can feel more confident, and break out of the black pants and a colorful top rut.

Before we get to how the three elements of color apply to putting colors together in your outfits, let’s talk about 4 color formulas that start to take the guess work out of using more colors–this is in the order of difficulty to get right

First, neutral plus a color. You’ve been doing this, so we’re not going to spend time on it, but I will say, if you’re super afraid of color, the best way to take a tiny baby step is to use other neutrals. Gray, navy, brown, tan, ivory–go crazy girl! Depending on where you’re starting from, this will feel like a big step, but I promise you it will be ok. Or, try neutrals on the top, and color on the bottom. This will shake things up even more, AND you’ll have some color on the bottom to make outfits with. A lot of women can’t 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. So it could be burgundy and burgundy, or burgundy with light pink–ive been talking for at least two years about how on-trend monochromatic looks 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 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 to see all the pieces that color comes in, so if you’re looking for antique navy at Jcrew factory, you can find it in tees and sweaters, as well as 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 tip. 

The third color formula is analogous–which is colors next to each other on the colorwheel, like blue and green, or red and orange. Analogous color schemes usually include 3 colors that are next to each other. I don’t really have a hack for this one–but it is a time where a colorwheel, or a picture of a color wheel on your phone is super handy. Pull an item from your closet, and find it on the color wheel, then look to the left, or the right, and find that color. Pretty simple.

Finally, #4, 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–purple and yellow, blue and orange, red and green. They do this 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. 

That’s not all the color formulas, but it’s enough to get started, so lets move on to those three elements, starting with temperature–warm vs cool colors and undertones. A lot of conventional style wisdom says warm and cool colors don’t work well together, but I don’t know that I completely 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–ivory and gray, olive and lavender. Mauve and mustard yellow. The trick is again, it’s not just about temperature. There needs to be cohesion somewhere in the outfit–whether through value or saturation. 

Another important characteristic of combining temperatures is the ratio. If the outfit is 50% warm and 50% cool, the temperature contrast can be highlighted–but using one temperature in a dominant way and one as an accent can create an interesting contrast that feels balanced.

The second element is value. One way value comes into play in your outfits is the level of contrast–or the difference between how light and dark the pieces of the outfit are. And 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 and white, while others look better in low contrast outfits–like ivory and light gray. How can you tell what’s best for you? It’s based on YOUR level of contrast. For example, I have low contrast–I have light hair, light eyes, light skin. High contrast outfits overwhelm me. On the other hand a woman with high contrast coloring might look a little 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 start with these three;

High contrast–like black pants and a white top. Medium contrast–black pants and a medium blue top.Low contrast–black pants and a burgundy top. 
Is it a style deal breaker if you don't match your contrast to your outfit’s contrast? No. But there’s a style magic that happens when you do–pay attention to women who look chic and expensive, and see if their outfit contrast matches their natural contrast. But I think what often happens is that we default to medium contrast with the black pants and a colorful top formula. Which is great if you have medium contrast, but if you don’t, there are better options. 
The Final element is saturation–how clear or muted the colors are–and just like colors looking good on you, this plays a huge, and usually overlooked role in how colors look together. The simplest formula is to pair clear with clear, muted with muted. But that can leave bright outfits feeling too bright, and muted outfits feeling too dull. 
This is a good time to use a  dominant/accent ratio– so if your outfit is mostly bright, add in something muted for balance, and vice versal  Also keep one other color element cohesive–so mixing saturations but keeping temperatures the same, for example.

Here’s what I want you to take away from how the three elements impact the way colors workn in outfits. It’s ok 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 you can play with to have better style , you’re going to feel like you’re stuck in black pants purgatory–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 your homework, let's 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 or cool undertones), value (light or dark), and saturation (bright or 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? Too light or too dark? Too bright or too muted? 
When putting colors together in outfits, you can use four formulas: neutral plus color, monochromatic, analogous, or complementary. Temperature, value, and intensity all affect whether colors work together. And remember—these elements have a compound effect. One element being off might be fine, but multiple mismatches is when things look off–there needs to be a cohesive thread running through the outfit to connect the colors.
There’s obviously a lot more we could say about color, but this is a big topic, and just understanding these three elements and how they work together is the groundwork for feeling more confident with color, which then allows you to practice, which, surprise surprise is how you get good at it. 

So here’s your homework. 

I want to challenge you to just start noticing and naming these three elements. Go to any website, and scroll through–look for warm colors and cool colors, high contrast and low contrast outfits, bright vs 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 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 identify the elements. If you’re feeling extra, try one new color pairing this week. It doesn’t mean you have to ditch all neutrals–but challenge yourself to work two non neutrals into an outfit somehow. 

I hope this this 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 it for this episode of the Everyday Style School. Thanks for spending time with me today. If you’re ready to make style easier and more fun, 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. Become a member today at youreverydaystyle.com. I’ll see you next time–and until then, stay stylish!