Below includes our best complimentary advice including using your natural hair colour as a guide and other further information on the colour analysis palettes.
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Through Carol’s client experience she has uncovered most clients (it is a VERY high percentage, if Carol was to ballpark it, it would be over 98%) who have tried to find out their colours on their own with no accredited in-person colour analysis training certification and on the ground colour analysis experience background have colour analyzed themselves to be in the wrong palette; wasting time and money. This also includes situations where perhaps someone has tried a colour analysis quiz, purchased professional colour analysis tools, followed DIY videos etc. We are not fans of supporting incorrect colour analysis results and people wasting time and money implementing incorrect colour analysis results, therefore we strongly discourage DIY Colour Analysis.
Carol Brailey has been through accredited in-person colour analysis training and has vast in-person and virtual colour analysis experience (see Carol’s bio for more).
If you would like to receive accredited colour analysis training, please see our Image Consulting Training Page.
If you would like to use the same physical drapes or online colour strips a professional uses please see the products at this link.
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Our Best Complimentary DIY Colour Analysis Advice Using the 16 Seasonal Colour System
(please note: all information on this website is copyrighted; see footer); please see this playlist on our YouTube channel to view colour references for each of the palettes.
To find out your colour analysis results, an accredited colour analysis professional will do colour comparisons on you with very specific colours following the 3 steps of colour analysis for both an in-person and virtual colour analysis: Step 1 – testing cool vs warm; Step 2 – testing which is your primary season (Winter, Summer, Autumn or Spring); Step #3 – testing whether your colouring is in harmony with more than one colour season; this step is where your undertone will also be confirmed: cool, warm, neutral-warm or neutral-cool or full neutral.
The information below is based on Carol’s vast accredited in person colour analysis training and experience with clients from around the world (both in-person and virtually) using the 16 season colour analysis system written to help guide a DIY colour analysis as we know there is great interest out there on self colour analysis. Seasonal colour analysis is based on your internal biology components that do not change in your lifetime and that is why some of your natural colouring and skin qualities can be helpful to use as a guide to rule in or rule out palettes.
Please note: we do not respond to queries on DIY Colour Analysis. If you have questions on below, please see our Image Consulting Training Page for further info options.
Using Your Natural Hair Colour Around Age 20 as a Reference/Guide:
Your natural hair colour around the age of 20 can be a useful tool to rule out palettes, but, in our experience it will never put you in a position to narrow down the field of possibilities of your best colours to one optimal palette without doing the colour comparison steps described above. Please also be aware in Carol’s experience she has seen all general eye colours in every palette and would never recommend using your general eye colour as a reference for colour analysis. Below is Carol’s advice for how to use your natural hair colour around the age of 20 as a useful tool to rule out palettes. If your natural hair colour below around the age of 20 is not covered below, it means that your natural hair colour cannot be used as a guide for you to rule out/rule in palettes and we would advise to focus fully on the colour comparison steps described above.
If your natural hair colour around the age of 20 was/is black or a very deep brown (less than or equal to level 4), it is safe to rule out the following palettes – Light Spring, Light Summer, Warm Spring. It would be unusual to be a Warm Autumn, Muted Summer, Muted Autumn. Palettes suggested for you to focus on and test would be: True Winter, True Autumn, True Spring, True Summer, Deep Winter, Deep Autumn, Cool Winter, Cool Summer, Bright Winter, Bright Spring.
If your natural hair colour around the age of 20 was/is blonde (greater than or equal to level 8), it is safe to rule out the following palettes – True Winter, True Autumn, Deep Winter, Deep Autumn, Cool Winter, Cool Summer, Bright Winter, Bright Spring, Muted Summer, Muted Autumn. It would be VERY rare to unusual to be a Warm Autumn. Palettes suggested for you to focus on and test would be: True Summer, True Spring, Light Summer, Light Spring, Warm Spring.
If your natural hair colour around the age of 20 was/is NOT in the medium brown range (including red-brown), it is safe to rule out the following palettes – Muted Summer, Muted Autumn.
If your natural hair colour around the age of 20 was/is medium brown (level equal to 6 or 7), it is safe to rule out the following palettes – True Winter, Cool Winter, Deep Winter, Deep Autumn, Bright Winter, Bright Spring, Light Summer, Light Spring. Palettes suggested for you to focus on and test would be: True Autumn, True Summer, Cool Summer, True Spring, Warm Spring, Warm Autumn, Muted Summer, Muted Autumn.
If your natural hair colour around the age of 20 is predominantly red (includes ginger, copper), it is safe to rule out the following palettes – True Winter, True Summer, Cool Summer, Cool Winter, Bright Winter, Bright Spring, Deep Winter, Light Summer, Light Spring. It would be VERY rare to unusual to be a Deep Autumn, Muted Autumn, Muted Summer. Palettes suggested for you to focus on and test would be: True Autumn, True Spring, Warm Spring, Warm Autumn.
What Does It Mean If Your Colouring Is Not One of These Palettes — True Winter, True Summer, True Spring or True Autumn?:
If your colouring is not True Winter, True Summer, True Spring or True Autumn, it means that your colouring has a mix of 2 of these seasons and therefore you are considered a flow. The flow palettes are – Warm (palette between Spring and Autumn), Cool (palette between Winter and Summer), Muted (palette between Summer and Autumn); Bright (palette between Spring and Winter); Light (palette between Spring and Summer); Deep (palette between Autumn and Winter).
A few examples…
Example 1: If your natural colouring has been found to be a Warm Autumn — what this means is that in Step #1 of colour analysis – you leaned warm, in Step #2 – you leaned Autumn, but, it was “a close call” in deciding that Autumn was better than Spring on you as your natural colouring also has some harmony and qualities of Spring, but, you ultimately decided that Autumn added to your sparkle better and you were also able to confirm Warm Autumn as part of Step #3 in the colour comparisons.
Example 2: If your natural colouring has been found to be a Muted Summer — what this means is that in Step #1 of colour analysis – it was a “close call” to decide between cool and warm as the Muted Summer palette is a neutral range palette and is made of up a cool season (Summer) and a warm season (Autumn); but ultimately you decided cool added to your sparkle better. To take this one step further you may also want to test Summer colours versus Autumn colours on you to further confirm as if you are a Muted Summer it would be a “close call” between Summer and Autumn on you as your natural colouring has harmony and qualities of both Summer and Autumn. Let’s say you still felt you leaned Summer, then you would move on to Step #2 of colour analysis colour comparisons and then continue on with Step #3 of colour comparisons to confirm Muted Summer.