How to Harmonize Your Clothes With Your Body Type

One of the very best ways to feel good in your clothes is to make peace with your natural body type. And I’m not talking about your weight.

I’m talking about your height, your facial features, your torso shape, your leg length, your waist/hip ratio, your natural limb shape - all of it. 

Because when you’re good with your body, you dress your body according to what is is - not what you wish it could be.

I’m 5’0” and I look 5’0.” I could follow popular fashion advice and attempt to “lengthen the leg” with long dresses, bootcut pants, and other elongated styles. But these styles actually make me look SHORTER. They create cognitive dissonance, swallowing me in an elongated line that isn’t native to my body. Nobody thinks I look taller.

It’s like putting round glasses on a very square face: all you do is draw attention to how square the face really is, when there was nothing wrong with the square face in the first place. 

I look my best when I honor how my body actually looks, which is short, slightly wide, and made up of blunt circle shapes. That’s what it is, that’s what it wants to be, and there’s no value judgment in that. I look best in shorter fit and flare dresses, boydcon dresses that stay close to my body (ending right below my knee at the longest), and skinny pants that taper at the ankle. I look best in jewelry featuring blunt circles or squares - a sharp triangle just makes me look rounder in comparison. I’m petite, so I look best in styles that are petite as well, without wafting too far away from the body or sitting on top of me with a heavy structure. 

The result is harmony, just like in a color analysis. When I wear colors that are foreign to my body, the result is a disconnect between the brilliant truth of how I really look and the costume I’ve put on. The same goes for style.

Image analysis isn’t quite as simple as “I’m tall, so I’ll wear long lines and call it a day” or “I have sharp features so I’ll wear only triangle and diamond shapes.” But harmonizing the proportions, patterns, and other design details of your clothing with your natural body type will always result in incredible sparkle. When you add your seasonal colors to the mix, it gets even better.

What's the Difference: Dark Winter vs Dark Autumn

I’m starting this series with the duo that was most-requested on Instagram: Dark Autumn and Dark Winter.

These two seasons are often mistaken for one another when assessing makeup and clothing. During a color analysis, it’s common for these two seasons to be the last ones standing. Why?

 
 
 
 

First, let’s explore their technical parameters:

Dark Autumn and Dark Winter are both situated between True Winter and True Autumn on the seasonal color clock, meaning that they are both blends of True Winter (cool, saturated, high contrast) and True Autumn (tawny, muted, medium contrast).

Dark Winter has a base of True Winter, with a dash of True Autumn’s warmth and richness. Dark Winter is a Cool-Neutral season.

Dark Autumn has a base of True Autumn, with a dash of True Winter’s clarity and saturation. Dark Autumn is a Warm-Neutral season.

One major difference between these two seasons is that Dark Winter contains “icy” colors: pure pigment with a drop or two of white added. Icy colors are light like pastels, but far more intense. My rule of thumb is that if you have to ask if a color is icy, it’s not. Dark Autumn doesn’t contain icy colors, and Dark Autumns are generally washed out by very light/bright colors like crisp white.

Darkness is the most important characteristic of these two seasons. That doesn’t mean Dark season people will necessarily look dark themselves, but they are enhanced by deeper colors in makeup and clothing. 

What happens when a Dark Winter wears Dark Autumn colors, and vice versa?

Too-warm colors will turn Dark Winter skin more yellow than it naturally is. Shadows under the eyes or above the lips may be accentuated. Bone structure may soften into a pudding.

Too-cool colors will turn Dark Autumn skin more ashy than it naturally is, sometimes adding blue to the lips or a hazy cast to the eyes. The bone structure may look harsh, even vampiric.

Dark Winters can combine the dark and light extremes of the palette beautifully. Colors are sharp, intense, and slightly jewel-toned. The palette boasts colors such as eggplant, black coffee, and holly leaves and berries.

Dark Autumns will strive for a layered look instead of extreme contrast. Colors are rich, spicy, and organic. The palette boasts colors such as marigold, paprika, and rich olive.

How do these two seasons wear their makeup?

Dark Winter will go for an overall cooler and “cleaner” look, with contrast between eyes, cheeks, and lips. Eyeshadows like MAC Blanc Type and Satin Taupe are at home here, along with eyeliners like Lancôme Black Coffee or MAC Photogravure. For cheeks, smoked berry-rose like Surratt Rougeur or Fenty Cool Berry. And for lips, deep pomegranate shades like Bobbi Brown Red Velvet or MAC Russian Red are stunning.

Dark Autumn will go for an overall more blended look, with more tone-on-tone layering. Autumn eyeshadow palettes abound, and Dark Autumns will be flattered by colors like MAC Charcoal Brown and Woodwinked. For eyeliner, Hourglass Bronze or MAC Teddy. For cheeks, contour and bronzer can be beautiful depending the individual’s skin tone, with copper-red blush like MAC Ambering Rose or NARS Taos. For lips, scorched reds like Estee Lauder Decadent or MAC Dubonnet are gorgeous.

Can these two seasons “cheat” with some of the same colors sometimes?

Technically speaking, colors belong to one palette or the other, and people will be most enhanced and magical in their own season. But in real life, a Dark Autumn may occasionally wear a Dark Winter burgundy, or a Dark Winter may reach for a Dark Autumn navy without feeling the effect too terribly. The success of this can depend on the size of the piece (an earring vs a sweater), where on the body the color is worn, and the individual in question. I haven’t found these two seasons to share many makeup colors successfully.

If you’d like to explore these two seasons further, check out my Pinterest boards:

Where Color and Archetype Meet

My colors didn’t 100% click for me until I started to incorporate my archetype. 

After learning my season, my makeup looked great and my closet was harmonious. But my outfits were still kind of...blah. Certainly more blah than I'd envisioned when looking in excited awe at the luxury drapes during my analysis. I wasn’t fully getting that WOW feeling when I looked in the mirror, because I still didn’t know how to pull the entire picture together. 

After learning my archetype, I saw how the shapes and design details of my outfit could combine with my seasonal palette to tell a story. I was more adventurous with my colors, and I knew which types of patterns actually looked good on me - a huge piece of the puzzle! I never really struggled after that. It was just a matter of asking myself questions about each piece as I bought it:

  1. “Is this my season?”

  2. “Is this right for my archetype?”

  3. “Is this right for my specific body proportions?”

  4. “What am I going to wear it with?”

Guesswork was removed.

For some, marrying color and archetype is an easy and intuitive process, especially if your season and archetype are commonly combined in the collective imagination (think Autumn Naturals and Winter Classics).

For others, it can feel like a battle when common seasonal and archetypal recommendations clash.

True Springs are often told to combine as many colors as they want in their outfits, because True Spring is lively and colorful. That’s true, it is - and this approach will work for many of the archetypes. But at the risk of looking chaotic, a True Spring Dramatic Classic may need to ignore this common True Spring recommendation. She’ll usually have more luck wearing one bold accent color, with neutrals (and maybe a smaller amount of another color) as supporting players. 

Likewise, a Soft Summer Romantic Gamine may struggle with the monochromatic color combinations often favored in Soft Summer forums, finding that her outfits lack spark. She may prefer to create strategic contrast with pairings of the lightest and darkest colors in her palette, or the warmest and coolest. Still, she will need to be careful when harmonizing, to make sure she isn’t unintentionally exceeding the boundaries of the palette.

In personal styling, there is no one size fits all. Each and every Light Spring will have a different stylistic interpretation of her palette, and each and every Dramatic will have a different stylistic interpretation of her archetype. A Light Spring Dramatic will combine her colors and archetype differently from a True Summer Dramatic, or a Light Spring Romantic Classic.

The only way to discover your preferences is to experiment! Use the knowledge you've accumulated on your journey to take steps toward a style that feels fulfilling and exciting to you. And if you want my help, you know where to find me.