How safe are you with colour? Are you a top to toe neutrals kind of person (which is absolutely fine by the way!) or do you love to wear colour?

What would I see if I looked inside your wardrobe? A sea of black, a carefully curated range of coordinating colours or a rainbow?

I’m asking because the way to wear colour has changed somewhat over the years and I’d love to inspire you to try something new.

The way most women wear colour is with black:

Black trousers and a coloured top

A black skirt and a colourful jumper or cardigan

A black dress with a colourful scarf

A black t-shirt under a coloured blazer

As I’m sure you know by now, the colours that suit you are determined by your natural colouring; your hair, skin tone and your eye colour. Once you’ve got your palette or your range of colours sorted, try mixing and matching some different combinations to look more up-to-date.

Things to Consider

Your body shape determines the best way to wear dark, bright and lighter colours. If your figure is pretty much in proportion I wouldn’t pay much attention to this, but it’s useful if you could do with a confidence boost!

Wearing darker tones on your largest part will minimise that area and wearing lighter or brighter colours on your slimmer parts will draw attention and help to rebalance your figure. It’s that simple.

If you want to look taller and slimmer, opt for one tone from shoulder to toe. This doesn’t mean wear one colour, more that the darkness or lightness needs to be the same. Try a dark red with chocolate brown for example.

If you’d like to look curvier, try to break tone. This means wearing dark and light colours together in an outfit to break up your figure and to create the illusion of curves.

What are the rules when mixing colour?

There are no rules!

Mix and match until you find something you love. Your clothing style will determine how much colour you feel comfortable in. Dramatics will likely feel very happy in lots of colour and those with a more classic or natural style will be happier in a mixture of neutrals. (Please mix up your neutrals! A combination of neutral shades can look totally luxurious).

I particularly love the look of wearing the same colour in different tones like this gorgeous outfit. For a more formal look swap out the logo t-shirt for a shirt or blouse.

Image courtesy of House of Fraser

How to get started

See this as your pick and mix colour counter – remember, there are no rules! Choose a combination that makes you happy!

Neutrals (that aren’t black):

Brown & Oxblood/Burgundy

Mix with pink, red, navy, brown, green

Grey

Mix with pink, red, navy, green

Navy

Mix with burgundy, purple, pink, green

Cream

Mix with brown, oxblood, conker, navy, teal

And in case you missed it the first two times, there are NO RULES! Start having some fun with your colours and neutrals and give the black a break.

What are you going to try? Leave me a comment!