Light Summer Color Palette: Best Colors, Makeup and Hair

Light, cool, delicate. If you're a Light Summer, your best colors are pale, airy and gently cool. Think soft pastels, cool pinks and powdery blues that let your natural coloring shine.

This guide pulls from the Light Summer Complete Guide we give clients after their analysis. It covers your core colors, what to wear in place of black, and how to choose makeup, hair color and jewelry.

Light Summer at a glance

Every season is a mix of four qualities. For Light Summer:

Undertone: cool-leaning.
Value: light. This is your strongest trait.
Chroma: soft to medium.
Contrast: low to medium.

Because lightness leads, depth and intensity matter more for you than temperature. A pale, delicate shade will usually flatter you more than a dark, heavy or highly saturated one, even if the darker one is technically cool.

Your best colors

Your core colors are candy pink, baby pink, violet, lavender, haze lilac, periwinkle, sky blue, cobalt blue, turquoise, dusty jade, mint aqua and pale lemon.

Your foundation neutrals are navy peony, charcoal gray, frost gray, taupe gray, cloud gray and antique white. Soft white, ivory, stone, rose taupe and blue gray belong to your neutral family too.

What to wear instead of black

True black tends to be too heavy for light, delicate coloring. For depth with a softer finish, reach for navy peony, deep navy, charcoal gray, smoke gray, cocoa brown or deep violet.

For denim, light, airy washes are your best, with soft medium and dark blue-gray washes for contrast. Skip stark black or very inky denim.

Color combinations that work

Try the 60/30/10 rule: one main color for most of the outfit, a second for about a third of it, and a small accent in jewelry, a bag or a scarf. Keep contrast low to medium, and stay light and cool.

Lavender, frost gray and antique white: a lavender knit, frost gray trousers and an antique white bag.
Sky blue, navy peony and pale lemon: a sky blue shirt, navy trousers and a pale lemon scarf.
Candy pink, taupe gray and antique white: a candy pink sweater, taupe gray skirt and antique white sneakers.
Periwinkle, cloud gray and baby pink: a periwinkle blouse, cloud gray trousers and a baby pink bag.

Tonal dressing is your sweet spot. Pieces that sit close together in depth look polished on you, so go no further than medium contrast.

Your palette through the year

Spring: pale lemon, baby pink and mint aqua with periwinkle, grounded by ethereal white and smoke gray.
Summer: light pastel blue, turquoise and orchid pink on light tan, with lavender and cobalt for depth.
Fall: dusty taupe, dusty rose and deep mauve with boysenberry, deep teal and slate blue.
Winter: navy peony, cloud gray and eggplant with iris violet, raspberry and cool silver.

Fabrics, prints and metals

Soft, airy fabrics like chiffon, cashmere, light linen and silk jersey suit your delicate coloring. Choose a soft sheen or matte finish over anything heavy or stiff.

For prints, choose light, blended, watercolor-style patterns with a soft cool base. If a print looks sharp, dark or high-contrast from across the room, it will likely overpower you. Aim for a print that's mostly your palette.

Your best metals are light and cool: platinum, silver, white gold and a pink-toned rose gold. A neutral, not-too-yellow gold can work too. Keep pieces delicate. For gemstones, try opal, aquamarine, blue topaz or amethyst.

Makeup for Light Summer

Lips: nude, rose, pink, mauve, berry and plum.
Blush: soft pink and mauve for everyday, with berry, raspberry and burgundy as deeper options.
Eyes: silver, champagne, pearl, rose gold, brown, gray and pink shadows.
Liner and mascara: navy, soft gray, taupe or soft brown liner, with brown or black-brown mascara.

For foundation, look at neutral-cool, neutral, or pink, red and rosy undertones, matched to your current depth. If the color you see on the surface of your skin reads differently from your undertone, a neutral foundation is often the easiest match.

Hair color for Light Summer

Your most flattering hair color usually sits within one to two levels of your natural roots. For Light Summer, the sweet spot is light ash, pearl and cool beige blondes, soft ashy browns and delicate highlights. Skip golden, brassy, copper and very dark tones.

Going gray? Silver and gray hair is naturally cool and light, so it suits your palette beautifully. Cool or silver toning glosses keep it bright.

Colors to skip, and what to try instead

Dark, warm and overly bright colors can overpower light, delicate coloring and leave you looking washed out or tired. Think black, warm chocolate, rust, burnt orange, pumpkin, gold yellow, olive, kelly green, brick red, neon pink, electric blue and lime.

A few easy swaps:

Black → navy peony
Camel → dusty taupe
Tangerine → baby pink
Mustard → pale lemon
Forest green → dusty jade

Your sister season: Light Spring

Light Summer and Light Spring share lightness as their main trait, so you can often borrow Light Spring's cooler pinks, aquas and blues when they're light enough, like petal pink, light rose, light magenta, light teal, aqua, cerulean and light violet. Skip its golden, earthy and bright side: peaches, corals, khaki, yellows and golds, and bright greens. Read more in the Light Spring color palette guide.

Not sure you're a Light Summer?

Light Summer can be confused with its neighboring seasons, and lighting, hair color and what you're wearing can all change what you see in the mirror. A professional draping compares colors directly against your face, so you can see the difference for yourself.

Book an in-studio color analysis in St. Louis Park, or start a virtual color analysis from anywhere. Private sessions include your own Complete Season Guide, digital swatches and three outfit checks by email afterward.

Color analysis is a professional opinion, and individual results vary.