I met up with a bunch of friends for breakfast in a brassiere last Thursday in Holborn. I was the last one to arrive at the table, without a hello or greeting one of my friends shouted ‘lady in red’ and another friend said “red is your colour!”.Then yet another friend asked me “have you got your colours done?”. He meant did I ever have a colour analysis done by a professional to see which colour clothes are the best for me. I was stunned and I thanked them for the compliments.

I was wearing a long red coat and a red wool scarf (very minimal design with no embellishments).

I knew these friends for around 3 years. I was dumbfounded because these were 3 men from different age groups/stages of life and they never mentioned anything about my physical appearance before. Whenever I changed my hair, they didn’t notice. Whenever I wore make-up, they didn’t notice. But when I wore a block of red, they felt compelled to say something.

I have always had an interest in colour. Personally, bright clothes make me feel happy and I knew some colours make my skin a lot brighter and rich and some duller and greyer. I am lucky to have ruby as my birthstone. The blood-red hues look amazing on my hands. Also, I discovered that the colour of the precious metal I was wearing is equally important. Through lots of soul searching and honesty, I know now that gold jewellery suits my skin tone the best. (I love silver jewellery!).

Paying attention to your skin tone and choosing colours is important to present yourself in the best light and the best way for people to notice your jewellery. A person’s jewellery can say a lot about the person’s personality and how they carry themselves. Does the way you view yourself align with how you are being perceived?

Knowing about your skin tone and knowing about the right colours to enhance your look will improve your life, helping to communicate with yourself and the world being the best version of yourself. We all know that first impressions count. Knowing your skin tone and knowing which type of jewellery colour suits you comes from having an honest conversation with yourself and trusting your eyes and instinct. One simple way is to put pieces of gold and silver jewellery next to your skin to see which colour brings the best out of your skin. Your gut will tell you. Listen to it. It can be hard because a piece of jewellery you or that was given to you may be the ‘wrong colour’, but listen to your instinct.

Another way is to figure out your skin undertone. Is your skin more a warm or cool colour? Warm undertoned skin will is more peachy, yellow or golden (skin more likely to tan, olive/blue-green veins show up more on your skin. If you have cool undertones, your skin will lean towards pink, red or blue (skin more likely to be sunburnt, blue or purple veins show up on your skin). Warm undertones tend to suit gold jewellery better and silver jewellery tends to suit cool undertones. Some of you might be super lucky and have a neutral undertone. Silver and gold jewellery suits you equally well.

If you are buying a piece of fine jewellery for yourself or for someone as a gift, invest the time to consider what colour would be the best match. It is more likely to enhance your look, therefore you are more likely to wear it and beam with pride wearing it. And as I discovered, it feels great to when you feel that you look great! And let’s face it – most of us want to feel good about ourselves and like the occasional compliment.

Improve your style, life and mood.

Everyone has a colour. Gold is my primary jewellery colour.

What colour of jewellery is going to bring the best out of you?