Which Season Are You? The Colour Rules That Changed Our Wardrobes

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I've always wanted to try the color analysis thing, and I'm so glad there's finally a filter for it.

But I need your help now. I have no idea what season I am? What do you think?

Hello, and welcome to Mama Mia out Loud. I'm Holly Wainwright, I'm Mea Friedman, and I'm Jesse Stevens, and today we have a very special episode for you. You may have heard us obsessing lately about a certain something, and that is our colors. Our colors, the colors we should wear, The science of colors. I think you started it, Jesse Stevens.

I saw it on TikTok, and then I became like one of those Internet experts who thinks that they can google something and go deep into a hole and nail it, even though I have no background. In fact, very dout with colors.

Turned out you got quite close, quite close.

Because I studied really hard, but we actually thought, why don't we do something we never do, which is.

Get an expert. So if you're going, what are you talking about with your colors. What colors you should wear is dictated by what season you are, and color experts like the wonderful Kim Crowley who joins us today, can read you and they can tell you exactly what season you are and then give you a whole range of colors you can wear. Kim, welcome, Thank you.

How did you become a color expert?

Him?

I'm a former fashion designer, so I had to know color. But I thought I knew everything there was to know about color because I was putting collections in store, particularly in England, and then I had to learn this went up skilled to become a personal stylist, and I thought, oh, I'm just going to skip over. It's a bit boring, isn't it a bit obsolete? Bit dated?

Yeah, because it was big in the what.

You had your colours die and I was kind of like of the era of Toppleway parties exactly.

And I didn't want to be associated. I'm just going to skim over it. In fact, I'm going to pull it apart to disprove it because it's no longer applicable. Otherwise it would have trickled down to our generation. And then I started pulling it apart, and I was like, oh god, damnit, I love it. Totally fell in love with science of color, and then I've used it every day since.

And you've got a business called style since that's what you do.

Absolutely, it's part of what I do. So it's often the beginning of what I do. Because once you understand your colors and the types of colors that suit you, because it's about types of color. It's not about saying, oh, holly blue suits you, it's the type of blue you need, a more aquerry blue. Then we can actually then build your color capsure around your palette and forget all that other stuff that just doesn't belong to you.

So everybody, regardless of skin tone, and there are many, many, many skin tones of course, regardless of skin tone, you can generally fit someone on the wheel of the season.

Absolutely, it's a seasonal wheel. Absolutely every single person sits on there and the whole wide world, men, women, everybody. And then there's spokes across the wheel because that's what makes it complicated.

Oh yeah, fun like star science. So when we got involved in this in the first place, Jesse diagnosed herself and myself as being springs.

I thought we were the same. And this is why, because this is my top line understanding with something about light hair, light eyes, fair skin ish. And then I thought that Maya was an autumn because she has dark eyes, dark hair, and olive skin. There's more to it than that, isn't there is? And that's when it gets complicated for me.

Quite down to earth.

So my colors are quite which I always suspected but didn't want to face because I was like, oh, it's just like burnt orange and brown beautiful exactly exactly.

That's the thing.

We all have kind of preconceived ideas of what that season might look like.

But because colour has had.

To modernize because the way we wear color now is different, the way colour is put into store. So when I used to design, it was very much gray based color. And most of my clients, when I ask them the four main colors that they wear before I meet them, they will say black, white, gray, and a bit blue. So that's a really easy palette that we've been wearing for years, decades, our parents, our grandparents, We see it in interiors.

Right, So you feel like you can't go wrong with those colors because they're like non colors exactly.

But you can go wrong, and you do because none.

Of those of yours, none of those are a lot.

Of people exactly exactly. So it's so interesting how we don't really think about color. We just buy into a palette and we think it's the right thing to do because there's loads of black, white, gray, and blue in stare like they're neutrals exactly, and they'll go with everything exactly, so we'd never really question is this right for me?

What about when the universe isn't in agreement with you? So you know how, we'll all be told, this is the blue everyone's wearing this winter, this is the pink everyone's wearing right now, and it's not in your season.

Leave it, so you just.

Keep fashionable this season it will be fashionable and I'm ever fashionable anyway.

The best thing about getting my colors done when Kim did them and knowing what they are, definitively the way I described it is it turns down the noise in getting dressed, in making outfits, and in shopping because it doesn't mean if there's a color that's not right on you, it doesn't mean you have to throw it away or you can't wear it. But it explains a lot of

Just makes you look.

Can look tired, can look ill For a lot of people if they're really cold, like Leely Campbell, if we put a yellow based color on here, she's going to look really yellow and ill. Right for you, if we put gray based color on you, you're going to look really ill.

And you said to me, because I said, I love this kind of blue eg very color. And you just said to me, sometimes we love a color that doesn't love us all the time.

Everyone knows experience of going to work, going somewhere and someone's like, the color looks nice, and you can't explain what it is like. Are we're looking for things that compliment our skin tone or something that brings it out? Explain?

We want to remain balanced, That's what we want to do, right. We want to look in hard, so we want to look like we're a bit rosier cheeked. We want to look like we've got to moisturizer exactly because when we were in a color that's not right for us.

You know, when we feel a bit oh.

I should have put more, I need to change my lipsticks. We think about changing ourselves and we don't need to change ourselves. Women are always trying to change themselves. And a lot of what makes me so passionate about this system is that it does explain exactly the reason why you're gorgeous as you are.

Stop changing.

Stop around about if you dye your hair and you mess with your colors, which were you know, and we wear musca and wee eyebrows and all that stuff. Am I changing my season?

Yeah?

Well no, you're not changing your season, but you're not complimenting it. So maybe what you're doing, if you're doing a radical hair change, which some clients do, you're then pushing your spring into maybe a winter or another season. So you're starting to fight. So therefore, all the clothes that you've enjoyed Holly, like this beautiful turquoise, you're oh, it's not doing what it used to do.

So if Holly, who is naturally blonde, like yeah, completely naturally blonde, if she then went dark brown, they.

Would flatten you fuck with her color season?

What if like, I don't even know what color I am anymore, probably mousey brown, and I've gone a bit brondy gorgeous, But what would be bad?

And I say we because we're warm and autumn, so if we go gray, we don't know it good.

There's a good reason.

Look, so you know some so when we see beauty women like who look amazing gray, it's more to do with their colors than.

It is because they're and they look amazing. So all my warmer clients, I will say, and I very rarely say this to people, to try a bit harder to keep their color. But I will tell them keep your color, keep your warmth naturally, because if you've got you know, a warm hair, warm skin, warm eye, and suddenly one of the components your hair goes very cold, you grown cold cold, You've thrown out your and then they don't feel very good about themselves. So the reason, yeah, it's

So Holly and I we're both fairy and we're both blonde, so on the surface we look like we might be part of the same savesand but we're not.

No, because you're cooler, Jessie, Yeah, and Holly's warmer.

So I'm a your.

Spring slash light spring spring on your summer slash light summer, okay.

And so for your cooler colours, work on me.

So more blue based color and more more pink than peach.

So even though you would think summer sounds like a warm season. The colors.

It's not that this is very complicated. It's why you have to.

Look at it.

White.

Podcasting is possibly not the best medium for this.

I have a question, is there any color that suits everyone?

There's actually a few, So a burgundy and a kind of mid navy is generally really good, and a pine green and an off white, so they're generally gonna look good on pretty much every person, which is why I used to design with a lot of those colors. And it's only now twenty odd years later I'm going, oh, so that's why they sold.

More than black. Whereas everyone thinks, oh, black suits everyone, it doesn't.

But black no one ever thinks about it. So only when we put a color on our body that isn't black or white or gray that we start to question it. And I'm like, it's hilarious how we haven't questioned all the wrong colors. We often then question the right colors.

I want to ask about sequence. Obviously I have gone off seating, but I'm interested to know where a saquin.

Fits in in your colors. So bronze gold not cold sacred print, can may wear leopard absolutely mere looks amazing. Leopard warm, you're better in your tall you know the brown that I put on you, which would be a photo of that brown for you, which is a bit softer and more pressy.

That's your leopard.

Okay.

Now this extends to jewelry too, right, whether you're a gold or a silver person. So is there a rule like summer is gold and winter is silver? Like what's the rule?

So spring and autumn, which are more warm, are more gold, and then your summer and your winter are more silver. So when I say silver, it's umbrella ing white gold, platinum silver. But Jesse, because you're a bit of light summer as well, you can actually do a little bit of pale gold. It really looks nice because you've got a bit of gold in your eye. So your cool skin, cool hair, a little bit of warmth in your eye. So that's where you can go a little bit warm with your metals.

There's a trend on TikTok discovered a lot of another one which is about going back to your roots.

Right.

Yeah, you're a lot of people, especially blondes, who have gone my true color season says that I should be a dark brown or whatever. Yeah, would you encourage people who feel like that it's not really working to kind of look back at what their natural coloring is.

Absolutely, I often say to people, go back to what you are. So what's really interesting When I'm analyzing people and they're coming to me, I look at the roots of their hair is often underneath at the back where we don't always color, and then I literally pull the.

Ends of their hair to their roots.

Right, And often it's like a to Z, yes, right, And what I'm saying is yeah, and we almost want D E and F in the middle, if that makes sense, because we're going from one extreme on the ends to from our natural and really what we're born with. We only really want to go two shade stark or lighter ideally with our hair interesting from a colour's point of

I have to keep going.

But where you suggest it's one of the hardest. In your color is beautiful because you have tones of warm and cool blonde.

Which that's terfect for you. And I often.

See people who sit where you sit go very white bond because it's easier for hairdressers to do that rather than get a very particular.

Because Malfoy and I also used to get They used to want me to go ashy, and I didn't like ash ash used to make me look sick. It used to and I used to have to try and explain the tone of bland, not the color, but the exact tone different.

You've got quite good color, beautiful except for the black you wear around your eyes, because as Kim was explaining to us, but I think my instincts are good as well, because I've always said I feel like it's too harsh on your eyes, and I was correct, And look.

I've been better lately, but then today I did default.

But Jesse, also, remember you could go softer in the colors, a bit more navy, a bit more olive, cocky, et cetera, rather than black.

Yeah, but you can.

Also go softer, as in more of a powder as opposed to a line.

Okay, does that mean.

How about a brown?

No more of a green, more of a green, more of a green or a navy.

I'm gonna do it on Wednesday. I'll wear a green brown.

Light brown is good but not chocolate. It's too dark and masculine.

It look like a lightly brown Yeah, okay.

I curse him like an icy dead people cursed. Do you'd walk around all the time just looking at people and going you're wearing all the wrong things. I want to tap them on the shoulder and the lift and just be like dah, not that yellow. No, no no.

If they're not asking my opinion, I'll try and keep my mouth closed. But I have run after people before I've got.

I saw someone when I went from my mammogram the other day that was wearing the wrong color, and I wanted to tap her on the shoulder, and but I figured, you know, no one's having their best day. Probably didn't need that.

Me wrong as well?

You run after someone once, you said.

And well, I often run after people when they're wearing the right color and go, oh, my god, that color looks amazing on you. Because often people say, oh, that looks great on you. My clients go oh, but hang, and I've been told this pink looks amazing on you. But did they say it looks amazing when you do?

They like the color?

Yes, I noticed a different. So last week I bought a shirt in a color that I wouldn't have normally. It was like a light terror cottery color, and I did an insta bubble. My Instagram was full of comments like, almost every single one that color looks amazing on you. Ye other times, if I'm wearing a really bright, vibrant color, they might say I love that color. But it was very interesting that they all said the same thing because the color amazing wasn't that interesting. It enhanced beauty.

That's what's really interesting.

A lot of a lot of my clients don't particularly, so when I'm doing, you know, a shop for them, I'll pre shop for them, right, so I get all their colors and shapes and styles and outfit them all for them and show them how their palette interacts, right, because that's really the genius part of this whole system,

I think the girls said it last.

Week when I was in and it was hilarious, like I was putting a spell on them or something. And because I've never picked that before exactly because you're like, oh, you know, we don't know.

How are we meant to know? Like we never learn how to dress ourselves. And that's why I think it is the truth.

I should be taught in schools.

It should be like English, right, like I and trying to wean myself off it because if I walk into a shop, I just will gravitate to the blue rack, right, I have so many blue tops and so many blue whatever did I know? I just knew that was the right thing.

Like it was because it makes you feel good, So you should.

Feel good in the colors.

Absolutely, that's the difference, because I can make people look better instantly, but it's the feeling better part. That's the bit that I care about most. I want to feel better in your clothes.

I have a question. Okay, you're at home, you're thinking about your colors, as I often do. Yeah, where do people start? So someone's listening and they're going, oh wait, I have blue eyes and brown hair and dark skin. I have absolutely no idea where do they start?

So we've done a little checklist, actually from the Nothing to Wear podcasts I did. We've done a little checklist for you. Pupping that Togey.

They've got a whole lot of because you can imagine how I've sessed I've been, so she's hyper focused. I've hyper focused on this. So we've put a whole hub of content where you can work out what your color is, find the best colors for you. And of course if people want to find you, they need to look up style sense.

Yes, style sense dot net dot au or look at my insta. I've got loads of examples on there as well, style dot Sense.

And you can then see people that hopefully will look like you because.

Hopefully now both of you, Holly and Jesse, now you're next to each other, right and we've done a little bit of color work, hopefully you can see what's unique about you rather than bundling you together. Does that make sense?

Because now I can go on to Pinterest and look up like summer. Yeah, will give me because now I know what to google.

And what I've done is I've printed out my best colors but also my worst colors, and I've put them stuck them on my mirror.

You need them, mer Wallet, Yes you don't have.

Because I don't. But if only you could take a photo and have it on your phone. I'll imagine that. I find it's so helpful to be reminded of what my worst colors are.

Yes, you're away from them.

I have one more question.

Fluoro is really hard, hard, cold.

Cold.

Can anyone wear them?

They are very, very, very very hard.

So probably there's a question though about that that might allow one to wear Floro? Are we really mostly talking about the colors you wear near your face? What about things you want on your body?

Are talking about every single thing you put on your body? Every single thing? Because I've had clients that I don't have pretty feet and I'm like, no, no, you've got great feet. You just need to change your nail varnish color and your shoe color.

And then they're like, oh my god, wear So you can't wear Floro pants with your navy.

Top if you really love because I'm not ever going to say you cannot ever wear a color. That's not That's not the way I teach. The way I teach is the more you shop into your palette, the better you're going to feel. The less clothes you have to own, the less money you spend, the less thinking you'll have to do, the less waste it's just brilliant and want the clarity that you get from being able to shop right. And a shop is listening and goes, oh, can you

Make three outfits?

Oh?

I can make thirteen or.

Thirty because it works with your power, works with everything.

And that's the quantifying this where I've seen clients before and they're like, no, I'm going to skip the color analysis part. Cour We'll just outfit your wardrobe because that's the other part of what I do. So literally pull ou their wardrobe out and we start to outfit all in brand new outfits right, things they've never thought about. We create maybe thirty to forty new outfits if they haven't had a color analysis. When they've done a color analysis,

I can say that suddenly, like that shirt that I bought in that sort of coralie terracotta color, Suddenly it's pulled together so many things in my wardrobe. It's so interesting.

And I need rules because I'm not intuitive about fashion, and I really struggle with it, and I want to think about it less. And I want to know when I'm looking online because.

You never know whether what you're looking at online is like color.

But even walking into shops, I just go, oh, obviously, got try it on for the size. But I'm like, I'm starting from zero every time, I'll.

Exactly so what we want to do.

We want to go into store and you go, oh, no, that pink's a bit too much, here's my pink. And then you shop into shape, right, so you go you can see your colors, and then it's shape second.

Because once you've taken the risk of.

Color out, all you've got to then do is figure out do I like the shape?

Is it the right? Do I need to go down a size? Probably? And all those things. The risk of color is.

Taken out, so you're shopping, you get to where you need to get so much quicker, because not everything is meant for you. And when I realized that about my own so much, it was like, oh, I'm.

Not trying to fight with black and silk.

Yes, life changing clearly and also out loud. As we're wearing the colors we're meant to be wearing right now. Yes, she's wearing all of them and wants a bit just on the spring. I'm the only this is the right blue for me.

Apparently this is the right one for me.

Those are Jesse's colors, So thank you, Kim. Of course you're wearing your color looks bloody lovely.

I do go off palette sometimes, but very rarely.

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