Warm, light skin tones (Light Spring)

Where this season sits

Light Spring is fixed by three things and nothing else: it is warm-toned, light in value and soft. Undertone decides which half of the wheel is yours, value decides how dark the colours run, and chroma decides how much grey sits in them.

Metals follow the undertone, which is why gold is the one to wear. The four neutrals below are the ones to build on, because a wardrobe is mostly neutrals and only occasionally a colour.

• #EDE3D2: very light, a cream (ΔE 1.3).
• #D8C6AC: light, a beige (ΔE 1.3).
• #A8917A: mid-tone, a camel (ΔE 8.3).
• #F5F0E6: very light, a cream (ΔE 4.0).

Colours that work on Light Spring

These are the colours from an ordinary shop rail that land inside the Light Spring palette. The number after each is the distance from the colour to the closest thing in the palette: under 12 reads as the same colour family, and everything here is measured rather than judged.

• Beige (#D9C6A8): ΔE 1.3 from #D8C6AC, one of the season neutrals.
• Cream (#F2E8D5): ΔE 1.3 from #EDE3D2, one of the season neutrals.
• Lavender (#B9A5D6): ΔE 5.2 from #C4B8E8.
• White (#FAFAFA): ΔE 5.2 from #F5F0E6, one of the season neutrals.
• Blush pink (#E8BFC4): ΔE 5.7 from #EFB6C8.
• Sky blue (#8FC1E3): ΔE 6.5 from #A9C6EC.
• Camel (#C19A6B): ΔE 8.3 from #A8917A, one of the season neutrals.

Colours to leave on the rail

These sit far enough from the palette that they read as borrowed from someone else's colouring. Black, chocolate brown, charcoal, navy, forest green and burgundy are worse than merely distant: they land on the season's own avoid list, which is the short list of colours that actively work against this colouring.

• Olive green (#6B6B3A): ΔE 22.1 from #A8917A, one of the season neutrals.
• Rust (#B7410E): ΔE 26.9 from #A8917A, one of the season neutrals.
• Emerald green (#00875A): ΔE 27.1 from #8FCFC4.
• Teal (#1F7A78): ΔE 27.7 from #8FCFC4.
• Fuchsia (#D6218C): ΔE 30.4 from #EFB6C8.
• Black (#111111): ΔE 47.2 from #A8917A, one of the season neutrals.
• Chocolate brown (#4A2C1A): ΔE 36.8 from #A8917A, one of the season neutrals.
• Charcoal (#36393D): ΔE 37.8 from #A8917A, one of the season neutrals.
• Navy (#1B2A4A): ΔE 46.8 from #A8917A, one of the season neutrals.
• Cobalt blue (#0047AB): ΔE 43.8 from #A9C6EC.
• Forest green (#22432E): ΔE 41.0 from #A8917A, one of the season neutrals.
• Burgundy (#5C1A2B): ΔE 42.4 from #A8917A, one of the season neutrals.

The seasons either side

Palettes overlap. Light Summer and True Spring are the closest to Light Spring measured across every colour in both, so if the season label ever feels one notch off, those are where to look first.

This matters more than it sounds. A twelve-season label is a convention imposed on a continuous space, and the honest reading of a borderline result is not a different label but a smaller claim.