Skin tone and the colours that suit it

It is the colour underneath your skin rather than on the surface of it. Surface colour changes with the weather, with sleep and with age; the undertone stays where it is. It is what decides whether gold or silver looks right on you, and whether cream beats optical white.

No, and mixing the two is the most common confusion here. Skin tone is how light or deep your skin is. Undertone is which way its colour leans — warm, cool or neutral. Every undertone occurs at every depth, so knowing one tells you nothing about the other.

Three checks, all by a window rather than under a bulb: hold gold against silver, hold an optical white shirt against a cream one, and look at the veins on the inside of your wrist. Two of the three agreeing is enough to settle it, and each undertone page below explains what its own result looks like.

A split result usually means a neutral undertone, which is a real answer rather than a failed test. It is also worth repeating the checks with a clean face in daylight, since makeup and warm indoor lighting both push the result.

It gives you half of it. Undertone narrows four seasons to two; depth and contrast decide which of those two you are. The free colour report does the whole thing at once, from a photo or from seven questions you can answer at home.