Hourglass body shape with neutral-cool, muted skin tones (Soft Summer)

The one thing to buy

Slim-fit shirts in grey. The cut comes from the hourglass rules, which put a slim-fit shirt +8.7 ahead of a neutral garment; the colour comes from the Soft Summer palette, where grey sits ΔE 5.3 from #A8A49C. A cut that follows the waist shows the line that is already there.

The colour matters here more than it usually would. A slim-fit shirt is worn near the face, so it is one of the pieces where a palette miss reads as tiredness rather than as a colour you happen to be wearing. Grey sits ΔE 5.3 from #A8A49C in the Soft Summer palette.

What to buy, and in what colour

A clean shoulder, a marked waist, and a clean leg line. That sentence is the shape half of the answer; the colour beside each garment is the other half. They are not applied evenly: 3 of the 3 garments the rules want for an hourglass are worn near the face, where a Soft Summer palette miss shows on the person, and the rest sit below the waist where it shows only on the garment.

• Slim-fit shirts (+8.7), near the face: in grey, ΔE 5.3 from #A8A49C. A cut that follows the waist shows the line that is already there.
• Structured blazers (+8.7), near the face: in grey, ΔE 5.3 from #A8A49C. A cut that follows the waist shows the line that is already there.
• Unstructured blazers (+8.7), near the face: in grey, ΔE 5.3 from #A8A49C. A cut that follows the waist shows the line that is already there.
• Boxy jackets (-10.7): the cut is the problem on an hourglass, and no Soft Summer colour rescues it. Boxy volume runs straight past the waist and reads wider than the body underneath it.
• Oversized shirts (-10.7): the cut is the problem on an hourglass, and no Soft Summer colour rescues it. Boxy volume runs straight past the waist and reads wider than the body underneath it.

The Soft Summer colours worth building on

Cool-leaning and very muted. Every colour has grey mixed into it. 4 of the twenty-four colours an ordinary shop names land inside the palette, and Coral is the furthest out at ΔE 21.1. For an hourglass these are the colours to find the 3 near-face pieces above in; grey is the neutral to build the rest of the wardrobe from.

• Grey (#9A9A9A): ΔE 5.3 from #A8A49C.
• Mauve (#9A7B8C): ΔE 5.3 from #96849A.
• Cream (#F2E8D5): ΔE 7.2 from #D4D0C8.
• Charcoal (#36393D): ΔE 8.8 from #4F4E4A.

Where the two disagree

They can, and the order matters when they do. Shape is geometry: a cut that adds width at the widest point does it whatever colour it is. Colour is a claim about a face at a distance, and it only binds on the pieces worn near one.

On this pairing it arises 3 times. A slim-fit shirt, a structured blazer and an unstructured blazer are worn near the face, so the palette binds there in a way it does not across the rest of what an hourglass should be buying. Hold out for it: Soft Summer gives you 4 colours that clear the bar, which is enough to find the cut you want in one of them.