How to Select Clothing Colors That Complement Red Hair and Light Eyes

Enhance your beauty by dressing in clothes that best complement your coloring. Build a wardrobe around colors that celebrate your features and make getting ready in the morning fun and simple.

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Men's Casual Pants
• Men's Casual Tops
• Men's Dress Shirts
• Men's Dress Sweater
• Mens' Dress Pants
• Women's Casual Tops
• Women's Dress Coats
• Women's Dress Pants
• Women's Dress Shirts
• dresses and skirts

1. Begin your journey into personal color by divorcing yourself from your favorite colors and whatever colors currently reside in your closet.

2. Look at your hair in the mirror. Are you a strawberry blonde? A true redhead? Or do you have coppery or auburn red hair?

3. Remove all traces of makeup.

4. Look at your eyes in the mirror. Are they clear blue or green, or a more pale shade? Perhaps they're hazel or amber.

5. Check your skin's undertones. Do you see more golden, peachy or beige hues?

6. Choose earth tones if you are a true redhead or have coppery or auburn red hair, and if you have green, hazel, amber or clear blue eyes, and golden undertones to your skin. Look for browns, tans, soft yellow greens, oranges, orange reds, muted golds and light camels. Grays, navys, taupes, purples and pinks will render your complexion sallow. Wear black for pants or skirts only.

7. Choose ivory, apricot, tan, beige, medium browns, violet blues, peachy pinks, clear aquas and golden yellows if you have strawberry blonde or light auburn hair, clear blue or green eyes, and peach or golden undertones to your skin. Marine blue and warm grays will work well for you, but black and wine will render you sallow.

8. Go shopping. You're armed with personally empowering information, so get out there and use it!

9. Try on colors that you've determined to be well suited to your coloring. Step out of the dressing room into light that is as close to daylight as possible, and ask a friend or sales associate for an opinion.

10. Look at yourself against a white or off-white background for an undistorted view of the color.

Tips & Warnings

• Experiment. There are a million colors out there; if you're unsure which one is right for you, try it on and get a few opinions.
• Color blind? Find someone you trust, give her your list of colors and have her help you select the shades most complementary for you.
• If you find a color you like that is outside of your range, consider it for pants or a skirt. Keep it far away from your face.

[marg0m]

on 11/26/2007 I have light auburn hair and gray, blur green eyes, with medium light skin with yellow undertones.
I look Fabulous in fall colors and Black, give me deep golden yellows, rusty oranges, terracottas, apricot, maroons, olives, moss green, Kelley green, and off white. But keep the pastels away from me they are hideous on me and so is red and all blues but (teal). It took me 50 years to get right.

[redheadmama]

on 10/5/2007 I have light to medium auburn hair and green eyes. I am usually pale and have pink undertones. I have found that with my skin tone being cool and my hair and eyes warm, I can wear any color I like as long as it isn't pastel. I look best in bold, bright blues and purples, warm yellow and reds, and my husband loves it if I wear a soft white color in the summer when I have a more gold in my skin tone. Black seems to be a good choice anytime, and rosy pinks are good, but not hot pink. I surprisingly don't like to wear green, and don't particularly like it on my identical twin, either. I would have to say that blue is the best color on me because it compliments the orange of my hair and makes it look even more red. Brown is good, too. Beige can wash me out and I think ivory is blah.

[stepho]

on 9/30/2007 Match your clothes to your skin tone. Most redheads have warm skin, but some of us have cool. I look good in deep jewel tones with a cooler tone to them. Deep purples and blues, for example. Try pulling your hair back into a ponytail when you try on clothes, and see what looks best. Then let your hair down. You may be focusing too much on your red hair and not enough on your face!

[redhead1093]

on 6/6/2007 I have dark red hair, pale skin with red cheeks and freckles. My eyes are brown and my eyebrows match my hair. My eyelashes are light red and the hair on my arms and legs is blonde. Go figure. I have no idea what colors to wear. My mother always wanted to put me in greens but I don't really like to wear green, except lime. I tend to wear black, white, pale pink (because I like it and I steered clear of it my whole life). I also think I look OK in navy blue but it's hard to find. Anybody have any thoughts?

[abigail]

on 5/17/2007 Oh my gosh... I'm so excited at the link to www.justforredheads.com! Never heard of it, but I'm going to be all over that! Awesome article - thanks!

By the way, I know I can't be the only redhead who grew up being gifted everything in green because they were so sure it would look great against your red hair...ugh. It took me until my 30's to start liking green again!