BENGALURU: If you’re on the beauty content side of social media, you must have seen videos of influencers showcasing the same shade of lipstick or blush looking like an entirely different colour on different skin tones and undertones. They usually attribute this to ‘colour theory’ and inform their viewers to keep it in mind while buying and using new makeup products. But what exactly is colour theory?
“The trend started a year or two ago when two brown girls in the US started showing how different the same shade of lipstick looked even though their skin colour was in the brown family,” explains Prthika Kumaran, creative director of Cocomiiiu makeup studio. “A lot of people started understanding that it’s not just fair-skinned people but dark-skinned people also have a variety of shades and there are different classifications based on shades and undertones.
It’s a vast subject including understanding colour families, colour triads, and primary, secondary, and tertiary colours. But it basically helps in gaining an in-depth understanding of why the same shade of lipstick or eye shadow will not look the same on different people—it will look very different based on undertones.”
An easy way to get start using colour theory to make your makeup choices is to figure out your undertone, which can be cool, warm or neutral based on whether the veins on your wrist appear blue, green or a bit of both. “They can be either warm, cool or neutral. Under neutral, there is the olive (warmer) category and a cooler tone category. Once people understand this, it is easy to understand what shade of lipstick, blush and eye shadow to go with,” says Kumaran.
According to Zohara Jamal, a popular makeup influencer, the trend has helped young people understand how to do their makeup better and make informed purchases. “Even someone like my daughter, who is just a teenager, is so much more aware than we ever were about anything that had to do with makeup. There are no solid rules when it comes to makeup; you can still do what makes you happy, but I think these videos help people make informed purchases. Makeup is sometimes advertised on just one certain skin tone, which can make it difficult to know how it will look if you’re five shades warmer or five shades lighter,” she says.
Kathleen Suzanne George, a 22-year-old professional, started experimenting with makeup in college. “I didn’t know what I was doing; I just went to the store and bought what the employee picked out for me. It was hideous because the colours did not suit me at all,” she says. This was around the time colour theory became a hot topic on social media.
“I’d heard about using colour theory for clothes before, but makeup was something new. I changed everything to fit my neutral undertone. So basically, all my lip glosses and lipsticks are shades of mauve because bright pinks don’t look good on me. My blushes are always peach because they look pinkish on my skin,” she adds.
While buying makeup, experts often advise cool undertones to go for cool colours and warm undertones to go for warm colours, with neutral undertones sticking to more toned-down warm and cool colours in the middle of the spectrum.
“For cooler undertones, makeup which has more of a purple or blue base will match, while a more orange base will complement warmer undertones,” explains Rashida Pavthivala, a locally-based makeup artist.
Suggesting the perfect lip and blush shades for different undertones, she continues, “Peaches, tans and warmer reds, like a terracotta red or berry red, will complement warmer skin tones. Anything which has more purple in it, like a magenta or a very fuchsia pink, will complement cooler tones.”