The Color of Style

Color of Style



Training Your Eye So now it’s time to begin choosing the colors that are going to bring out your true self. In the following three chapters, you’ll learn how to find your true colors, identifying your essence, romantic, dramatic, energy, and tranquil colors as well as your three bases. In later chapters, you’ll go on to discover your Season and claim your Archetype, which will help you identify even more facets of your authentic style. You’ll also learn how each color affects your emotions and the emotions of those around you, so that you can use color to create the moods and impressions appropriate to each occasion.

¥ Identify your essence, romantic, dramatic, energy, and tranquil colors, plus your three bases neutrals that are your own individualized versions of black, brown, and khaki.

¥ Discover your Season: Spring, Summer, Autumn, or Winter. Creating Your Authentic Style It’s all in the palm of your hand  Claim your Archetype: one of six distinct types to be found in each season, which will give you further ideas for colors, clothes, and objects that express your authentic self.

First, though, I’d like to help you train your eye to identify all the subtle nuances of shade, tint, and hue. So let’s go shopping. No, not in a department store or boutiqueÑ not yet, anyway! I want to send you on a field trip to your local grocery store. Now, don’t panic. I’m not going to suggest some reality show exercise where you have to create haute couture out of celery stalks and coffee filters. I am going to send you over to the produce section, where you can focus strictly on color and not be overwhelmed by hemlines, designer labels, and price tags. Of course, the colors in a grocery store are nothing new to you but neither is your image in the mirror. So let’s find out just how closely you can look at a familiar sight and how many new aspects of color you can perceive.

Research has shown that humans have the ability to differentiate up to ten million subtleties between colors. Are you really “seeing” the colors that you choose to wear? Here are some ways to talk about color that might help you notice more of those subtle differences:

¥ Saturation: How bright is it? A bright, intense color is highly saturated; a pale, delicate color is less saturated.

¥ Value: How light or dark is it? Think about a bar of deep, dark chocolate and a cup of cocoa into which some whipped cream has already melted. Both colors are versions of “chocolate brown” but the two colors have different valuesÑ and might well look flattering on different people.

Reprinted by arrangement with Dutton, a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc., from THE COLOR OF STYLE by David Zyla.

Copyright © 2010 by David Zyla