When was the last time you paid big bucks at the salon for a great color, came home, looked at yourself in the mirror in a different light, and realized: something’s wrong. not in this color. Maybe you can’t quite put your finger on it – you asked for blonde or golden brown and that’s what the stylist gave you. But, spend over $100 later, and you’re sure of one thing: that new shade doesn’t do you justice. It clashes with your skin tone and just looks fake. It can be hard for mere mortals who aren’t hair color experts to understand why some shades make us glow and others make us feel like we’ve been in bed with the flu for days. That’s why we brought in two hair experts to help make sense of it all.
This hack helps you find the best hair color for your skin tone, once and for all.
Analyze your veins
This is one of the oldest hair color tricks in the book. Celebrity hairstylist and hair color guru Michael Canale stands by the vein test method to determine what color shade or highlights you should ask your stylist to create for you. “Let your own skin tone guide you in choosing your best hair color,” says Canale. “Look under your wrist to see if your veins are blue or green. If they’re blue, you have a cooler undertone, and if they’re green, you have a warm undertone. Cool tones should be Scandinavian, ash-based, aka white blondes. Warm tones would be a spring shade, like golden brown to strawberry blonde.
Judging by the color of your veins, doing a reddish color on a cool undertone that doesn’t match your skin tone is a shame, says Canale. “The worst thing you could do as a cool undertone would be to add warm tones to your color,” says Canale. “The wrong color will totally wash you out.”
Or look into your own eyes
Maybe you’ve tried the vein test and still end up not knowing if your arm has more blue or green (and in fact some people have both colors and are more neutral than cool or warm ).
Natalie Sibert, Senior Stylist at Mirror Mirror, has a tip for that. “To determine your best hair color, look at your eyes,” says Sibert. “Your skin tone changes with the seasons and you always have to adjust your makeup when you change your hair color, but your eye color is constant. The best color for your hair is a tone that will complement your eye color.
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By noticing the flecks of color in your own eyes, you may be able to perfectly choose the best hair colors for you. “Do you have a little green in your eyes? Try warmer colors,” says Sibert. “If your eyes are more gray or blue, highlight them with cool highlights or a rich brown to create contrast and make your eye color pop! If your eyes are golden brown, try a rich, warm tone. If they are a very dark brown/almost black you can pretty much do anything.Always look at the flecks of color in your eyes and go from there.
