Clothing Colors That Make You Look Younger
We can all agree that, after a certain age, a common goal of ours is to look as youthful as possible. Did you know there are some colors that can help in brightening your appearance and help your complexion appear younger? Well, believe it.
From anti-aging treatments like Botox and Dermal Fillers to collagen supplements and working out daily, looking younger is on all of our minds. As we age, we tend to reach towards products and activities that can keep our bodies and our appearances as youthful as possible.
But what if there was a simple trick you could take advantage of every day to look younger?
Choose the right colors for your outfit! It’s important to pay close attention to colors that bring out your “glow from within” and to know what works against them.
Which Clothing Colors Make You Look Younger?
Colors that are light, bright, and warm make your skin look more vibrant and healthy. In turn, wearing these youthful colors makes you look younger. Wear light colors that enhance your skin's undertone and visually reduce the contrast within your skin. Light tints of yellow, red, and blue-green look very youthful. So do many strong colors.
Down below we will list our best tips and tricks to appearing as youthful as possible by simply using color. We all would like to look as young as we did in our mid-20’s, right?
Just remember, you’re skin tone and undertone can affect the way certain colors appear on you! Try to find something you enjoy wearing. Confidence is key!
A SIMILAR ARTICLE:
To Look Younger: Lean Lighter, Not Darker
If you knew we were heading here, you read our mind! There is a reason dark colors are worn specifically for when we mourn or want to look professional and powerful.
Light = playful / Dark = serious. | Socks: Rainbowie
There are not many who can pull off wearing dark colors without appearing somewhat like the walking dead and a lot who cannot.
Darker colors can (in many cases) pull all of the vibrancy away from your complexion, accentuating the blemishes- such as our fine lines, hollows, and wrinkles. It acts as a contrast, making your complexion appear ghastly against it – especially if you have very fair skin.
Research published in the Journal of the American Academy of Dermatology proves that high contrast within skin influences the perception of age, attractiveness, health, and youth – but in a bad way.
On the other hand, high contrast between elements of the face (brows, eyes, lips, etc.) and the skin makes you look younger, as this study suggests.
This means that people think you look younger if you have less contrast on your skin, but more contrast between your skin and your lips, eyebrows, lashes, hair, and so on. So, how do we accent some of these features but not the others?
Now that’s a tough question...
Dark colors age us (but only visually, of course). They are too harsh with too much contrast to our bodily features. For example, when you wear black or a really dark blue, these colors can accentuate your darker features and highlight your lightest ones. This enhances things like wrinkles, blemishes, and impurities.
Those under-eye circles, your pale complexion, and if your skin is experiencing any dullness, will be extremely visible when you wear darker colors as well.
Although, when you wear lighter colors, these can bring out and highlight your skin’s colorful undertones, making you appear more youthful.
If you are planning on wearing black, don’t wear too much of it or too close to your face! Black can drain you from your own coloring, leaving you looking pasty and dull. Keep black as an accent color or use it as a statement if you wish to have an overall younger appearance.
As stated by the prolific graphic designer Herman Cerrato, pure white is the “color” of purity, innocence, and yes, youth. Therefore, it’s no surprise that most hues that have a large amount of white mixed into them seem more youthful. This effect on the colors themselves transfers to the wearer of those colors as well.
More on the symbolism of white clothing in our article on the topic. Read it by clicking on the link.
Lastly, light colors like baby blue and playful pink have a specific connotation in common: naivete! Since we as human beings are used to seeing these light colors in children’s bedrooms and on toys, they look even more youthful to us.
Tones and Certain Pastels Look “Old”
Although lighter colors bring out the life within, that doesn’t mean it relates to every light color out there. Some colors don’t bring out anything, and can actually make your situation worse than it is.
Avoid any colors that are grayed out, lack vibrancy, and come to close to your own skin undertone. They will more often than not strip the color from you. Sadly, this relates to a lot of common clothing tones and pastels!
Take Benjamin Moore Proposal AF-260 pink, for example, this color can negatively impact your complexion. As this color is light but lacks the vibrancy bright pink has, it won’t do anything for your complexion, except wash it out completely, making you look older than you are.
The gray undertone in it will emphasize nothing but your age, and make you appear meek. This goes for most toned colors, as these washed-out colors will make you look dull and toned down (obviously). You need something that will bring out the youthful complexion within you!
We suggest going for more vibrant pink instead. Remove the gray portion of the color and you get the following:
Much better (and more youthful), isn’t it?
Tired of feeling “old”? Try RevitaaPro! It reduces fatigue and stress helping you become more lively and energetic again.
Brighter Colors Will Bring Life Back into Your Complexion
Brighter colors are more fun! For good reasons. Not only are they pretty to look at, but they can make you look and feel younger.
They have this vibrancy that helps your skin tone look more vibrant as well.
Bright yellows, corals, and even bright pinks have the ability to make your complexion look radiant. They bleed life back into your appearance.
Choosing the perfect bright color depends on your skin tone and undertone. Look back to our article, The 10 Golden Rules For Color In Fashion for this specific reference and more information or check out our articles on clothing colors for light and for dark skin.
Each individual has a “color category” that can help them look their best and present themselves unlike ever before. Are you high or low contrast? Are you warm-colored or rather cold? These specifics can change the colors and shades/tints of colors we would suggest. Every color can affect a person differently.
But, as a general rule, going for strong and bold colors will make you look more youthful.
Think of Halle Berry, Cindy Crawford, and JLO. They make reds and vibrant pinks their go-to colors for red carpets. These specific bright colors bring a vibrancy to their complexion that helps them garner this youthful glow! They look stunning and young whenever they grace us with these jaw-dropping outfits.
Men, on the other hand, can make use of small smidges of bright colors in their outfits to look young and ambitious. Stick to our guide on accent colors for men to learn all you need to know and to never go wrong when accenting your get-up.
Warm or Cold Colors?
It’s true, warm colors can shed some light and bring life back into your appearance. Warm attracts warm!
When you wear a warmer color, such as red-orange or yellow, you are bringing vibrancy back into your complexion.
But sadly, there’s one little exception to this guideline... If the hue of one of these warm colors matches your skin undertone perfectly, it can have the opposite effect. More on this topic in the future. Get our Member Letter in the meantime.
That healthy glow we all strive for, the one that dwindles as we age, appears whenever we wear more color. Especially warmer colors!
All 6 of the warm hues.
The other 6 cold hues.
On the other hand, cooler colors are known to cool our skin tone down, so the warmth isn’t drawn out. Cool tones often make us look ashy and sometimes even sickly, whereas warm tones can add warmth (obviously) and glow back into our complexion.
Take yellow, for example. There is a reason it is referred to as a sunshine color, and it’s not just because it is the color of the actual sun.
When you wear yellow in its true, fully saturated form, not in a shade, tone, or tint, this can truly brighten your complexion and make you look young and vital. It can add light back into your appearance and lower the harsh contrast.
Yellow is also one of the most eye-catching colors. Wear it if you would like to stand out.
Every person has a specific “type” of yellow they can pull off like a dream. Just because yellow didn’t work for you before, doesn’t mean it can’t work for you ever again. Maybe you weren’t trying the right kind of yellow or were wearing too much of it. A little goes a long way.
We have a full article on the most youthful of colors. Check it out here:
It’s More Than Just Color
As our skin looks duller as we age, (thanks to reduced levels of collagen production), any colors that enhance or highlight these factors you should definitely stay far away from.
It is important you reach for colors that bring out your inner glow. Wearing these vibrant colors we mention above can actually boost your mood as well!
There are multiple studies that show certain colors, such as yellow, can actually influence our emotions and current state of mind.
Sadly, yellow isn’t the most ideal color if you have gray hair. There are many other options that give you the best of both worlds, though. You can read up on them by following the link.
It’s important you feel comfortable and confident in the clothing you wear. This can not only impact how you present yourself, but how you feel as well. When you feel good, you look good.
Happy people are known to represent “rays of sunshine” almost like they are bursting with happiness from within. And for good reason! Happier people exude happiness from the inside out, and crazily enough, they also appear more youthful.
So, as always, it’s more than just color – even though the right colors get you a long way.
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