Ever wonder what happens in personal color session?
Wonder no more! Today I’m giving you an inside look at a real-life personal color session I had recently with one of my clients. Shelly is a high technology marketing professional who does contract work from the comfort of her home. She also goes into the office, dressing up for business presentations to executives and clients.
Her wardrobe goals? To move away from the color black and find clothes that she likes and looks good in. Shelly wanted to look credible and approachable. She needed to visually communicate her managerial expertise as well as the ability to be a team player, with the ultimate goal of career advancement in mind.
The first thing I had Shelly do is some homework: I asked her to bring a few items that she enjoyed wearing. This is what Shelly brought to her Personal Color Analysis Session:
As you can see, business casual with a suit jacket and pants is as dressed up as she likes for work. And while she wants to wear more color, Shelly needed advice on how to put it together as well as tips on which colors she should choose for her best look.
During her Personal Color Analysis, I spent a few hours with her building a color palette of all her best colors. These colors where then put into Shelly’s own personalized color fan which she gets to keep as a reference tool. I selected colors that picked up the color of her blue-green hazel eyes, with color names such as Tourmaline, Blue Spruce, Ocean Blue, Transatlantic Blue.
And then for these photos I dressed her in the recommended colors.
Pay attention to the colors, color combinations and your gut feeling about what the colors do for her.
Notice we dressed her in the softer, grayed green pants and shirt. This is a column of color she can mix and match with other colors on her fan. We paired this color with tans, blues and white—and not just any white—Shelly’s white, which complemented her skin tone. You can see really see Shelly—these colors look natural on her. And, she looks comfortable, credible and approachable!
Now compare these combinations to the colors in the outfits that Shelly brought. Notice how black makes her look harsh and less approachable. In those pictures we see Shelly’s clothes and not Shelly. It is fiction that “everybody looks good in black.” Shelly has light brown to blonde hair. And the black is very heavy on her. She lightens up and shines in the lighter colors that relate to her personal coloring.
Who would you rather work with?
Next time we will dress Shelly in her dark neutral.
And spoiler is it’s not Black!