Your undertone is one of the trickiest things to determine, but also one of the most important. After all, we usually choose clothing, jewelry, makeup, and hair color based on our undertone.
There are 3 categories of undertones
- Cool
- Neutral
- Warm
What does undertone actually mean?
If you have a cool undertone, you have more pink in your skin.
If you have a warm undertone, you have more yellow in your skin.
If you have a neutral undertone, you have a good balance of both.
What makes determining those undertones so difficult?
I will now discuss various dates. If you do not understand what I am talking about, I recommend reading this article first > Colorimeter.
Within the different undertones, there are various gradations. For example, not everyone with a cool undertone is equally cool. You have people with an undertone of 0, but also with a 3 or 8. Both are cool, but they still look different. The same applies to a warm undertone. I get people in my salon with an undertone of 11, but also people with a 6. Both warm, but different. Neutral is a bit easier, but you often see that people with a neutral undertone tend either towards the warm or towards the cool.
Because of those differences in undertones, we literally see you differently than you actually are.
If you have a warm undertone, meaning you have more yellow in your skin, our eyes literally see you as darker than you actually are. To our eyes, yellow appears darker than pink. If you have a cool undertone, meaning you have more pink in your skin, we see you as you actually are. Pink appears brighter to our eyes. With a neutral undertone, it is slightly easier; due to the balance of both in your skin, we see you as you truly are.
Undertone with the different color depths.
Your color depth can also make it difficult to determine your undertone. With different color depths, the pink or yellow in the skin will look different, but you can have all different undertones with any color depth. A warm/yellow undertone will always look yellow, from a light to a deep skin tone. Only a cool/pink undertone transforms slightly. That is also the reason why so many people with a cool undertone are misjudged.
From approximately color depth 67, that pink undertone changes into a sort of peach color. That color is often (incorrectly) perceived as yellow. However, there is definitely a difference. If you have a deep color, it becomes more of a blue color. All cool.
