Tips to help you find your best color match.
Finding your perfect foundation match is difficult to begin with. But trying to find your shade when the seasons are changing and your skin color is too, can be even more challenging. You might have bought foundation at the height of summer when you had a fresh tan, or still have that bronzer that you rely on for a glow in the winter.
Perfecting your makeup during any season comes down to having the proper shades, and that’s where color matching is key.
1. Identify Your Skin Tone By Brand
Everyone’s skin tone is different, so it can be tricky to fit your own skin tone into an overarching classification that doesn’t take its nuances into account. But for the sake of color matching, it’s important to understand how brands break this down. There are different undertones and various shade categories that companies bucket their complexion products into. But the first step is to begin with the basics. Start by identifying what general category your skin tone falls under: fair, light, medium, tan or dark (sometimes also called deep). It’s best to do this during a time when you won’t have extreme sun exposure or weather conditions that could affect your skin tone. Keep in mind that different brands will have different names for these categories, but they’ll encompass the same traits.
2. Determine Your Undertone
When it comes to finding makeup that matches your skin, your undertone (the hue that comes through your skin and affects its overall color) plays a large role. To identify your undertone, start by taking a look at the veins on your wrist. If they appear blue or purple, you’re cool-toned, while green veins indicate warm-toned skin. If you can’t make this color distinction for your veins, you likely have neutral undertones.
Another method is to consider what color jewelry looks best on you. Do you steer toward silver or gold jewelry? If gold complements your skin tone the best, you’re warm, while looking good in silver indicates cool undertones. If you’re an equal fan of both, you may have neutral undertones.
3. Patch Test Foundation On Your Best Spot
Once you’ve identified your skin tone and undertones, go ahead and browse at foundation ranges. You’ll notice that most brands have a method of breaking down both the shade category and undertone to help you find your best match. For example, warm tones are often represented with a W, neutral with an N and cool with a C.
For many people, one of the most accurate ways to find your match is to test it out on your jawline. Your jawline tends to lack redness that other areas of the face are prone to, so it can be a great place for determining your shade. However, if you have hyperpigmentation on your jawline, skip foundation matching in that area and opt for another area on your face that can match your overall complexion better.
Source: L'Oréal
