‘Colour analysis’ is taking over TikTok — But how will deciphering your season improve your wardrobe?
If you have been on the fashion side of TikTok recently, you will have noticed a surge in videos of people analysing their own colours. But what is a cool winter or warm summer? And more importantly, why is everyone chucking out their wardrobes and getting their auras read?
First and foremost, we are all, according to the trend, in some sort of season. And these seasons should dictate how we cultivate our wardrobes according to our own colouring (including skin tone, eye colour, hair colour, and, undertones). The at-home idea comes from the self-help book published by author Carole Jackson around 40 years, who wrote ‘Color Me Beautiful: Discover Your Natural Beauty Through the Colors that Make You Look Great & Feel Fabulous!’ Though she may not have invented the method (the origins are unknown), the book was a mainstay for women trying to figure out their own colouring and cheat the fashion system to create a wardrobe perfect for them.
The book even included swatches to try at home yourself, which TikTok users are now doing digitally to help them figure out their seasonal colour preferences. Colour consultations have risen in popularity recently thanks to social media, with #colouranalysis reaching almost 640 million views and counting. The trend has even prompted filters that can help you do it at home, which show your face in the centre of numerous colour wheels to see which helps you glow best, and which brings out your most prominent features.
IRL consultations run along the same lines and see a colour specialist (with a good eye) drape the client in a bib against a neutral background as they hold up various shades to the face to figure out which are the most flattering. The consultations aren’t saying someone definitely cannot wear a certain colour, but they instead encourage options to figure out what accentuates features and what doesn’t. And these can even be done over Zoom!
The seasons (summer, autumn, winter, and spring) all have subsections: a soft, cool, or calm summer; a soft, warm, or rich autumn; a bold, cool, or crisp winter; and a clear, warm, or fresh spring. Users are drawing comparisons to celebrities as examples, with the likes of Sarah Jessica Parker falling under summer, Julia Roberts under autumn, Megan Fox under winter, and Taylor Swift under spring. It’s rather a hard concept to grasp at first, but the content online is a self-help guide in itself. It’s almost as if Jackson’s book has gotten the 2023 treatment.
These ideas then spread to your jewellery choices and finding out which metals compliment your new and improved palette. The colder months opt for warmer jewellery like rose gold or gold, and the warmer months favour colder tones like silver. Then comes the beauty element, to which it may be time to throw out that old palette and invest in some specified neutral shades to match your new colourful wardrobe. The analysis can even go as far as differing between eyeliner shades, with metallic black and blue black falling under these categories too. Maroon, vermillion, scarlet, burgundy, raspberry, or coral? You can also get the lowdown on your new go-to lippie shade.
This type of intuitive styling is also encouraging energy field readings, and aura analysts are weighing in on the subject. This branch of colour analysis sees individuals attend an aura reading, which can help when matched with aura photography (taking your portrait to see which light is attracted). This field suggests that your emotions and experiences can influence your colour analysis, and it can change depending on your specified lifestyle. These types of readings are all in an effort to know the real you, which can help rebuild your wardrobe and improve your life. So colour analysis, as skin-deep as it may seem, is really a motivating self-help scheme to inject some joy back into your wardrobe, and effectively, your self.
