I have a happy colour. I don’t wear it all the time, but it’s a colour that never fails to make me feel happy. Now I know that you see me wearing blue lots and lots, and I do love blue, it’s a favourite colour for me (and a great eye enhancer too), but for me, this colour is Hot Pink (which is actually a skin enhancer).
When I was a child I never had any pink clothes (it was the 70s and everything seemed to be brown and yellow and maybe some bottle green). I didn’t start wearing it til sometime in my teens in the 80s, and I remember having a dress with hot pink stripes and people always saying how well the colour suited me. Over the years I’ve had lots of hot pink diaries, notebooks and my tape dispenser and computer mouse are both hot pink.
Hot pink ballet flats from Scarlettos Shoes
I’m lucky that with my cool colouring a blue-based hot pink suits me. It’s such a vibrant and dynamic colour it always makes me feel more energetic and I love to wear it in winter or cooler days as I like the energy of it particularly in Melbourne where it can be grey frequently in winter.
When everyone else is wearing boring black, I like my hot pink to brighten and warm up my days!
I wear it in larger proportions and smaller proportions as an accent depending on my mood and the outfit. My pink shrug (also one of my go to my style pieces), jewellery for a pop of colour, as well as a few key garments.
One of the reasons it works is that it represents part of my style statement or style recipe word selection. My words are:
- Unexpected
- Vibrant
- Divine
- Distinctive
- Dynamic
- Exciting
To me hot pink is vibrant, dynamic, exciting, distinctive and divine and often unexpected (in this world of black clothed people many of us live in).
Do you have a happy colour? What is it? I’d love to know why you love it – how it makes you feel and why you’re attracted to it. Do the adjectives that you use to describe your happy colour also represent elements of who you are and your style recipe?
My happy colour is golden yellow and has been for as long as I can remember.
I have gone through intermittent periods of orange and lime green – especially the citrus shade. I am well known amongst my friends for loving these brights.
And tell me – what does it make you feel? how would you describe golden yellow?
Hi Imogen,
You are as beautiful on the outside as you are on the inside. Thanks for sharing and for all you do.
A faithful fan,
Pat
Awww Pat, thanks!
I am such a fan of a warm yellow too. In almost any shade imaginable, but I am partial to the deeper ones. Yellow is inviting, unexpected, bright and it makes me feel like wonderwoman :-). The wallpaper in my living room has bright yellow flowers and it makes every day feel like summer.
Sounds gorgeous
Pink is my happy color too! I sewed many of my clothes as a youth in the 60’s with pink wool, pink polka-dots, pink stripes. All my pjs are some sort of pink. I have suede boots, watches, hats, jeans, coats, way too many tops/sweaters/cardis (hard to let go of them). I wear the bluer pinks (think magenta) in the winter months and warmer pinks (hot) in the warmer months. I lost a dear sister and two cousins to the BRCA 2 breast/ovarian cancer gene, and I feel like I am honoring them when I wear my happy color.
I love the post- I used colour two days ago to my advantage deliberately wearing yellow (warm undertone) to boost myself and make myself feel more confident for a difficult medical appointment. I felt so good after – touched up make-up make up and went with my new hair cut to a meet-up group and was asked for my number by a not so bad looking guy:)
Edwina
Now there is a win!
???
I love pure red. (Well In my case from the elegant swatch). In my eyes red is unexpected, vibrant, zesty, expressive. It makes me feel energetic and being alife ?. It fits perfect in my creative-dramatic-elegant personality, although I dont have much red in my wardrobe yet… My red leather moto jacket is my “hero”…
For me, I like the deeper, almost “berry” shade of hot pink the best. I’m wearing a deep raspberry vee-neck, long sleeve tunic tee over my black skinny jeans. It makes me happy! My other happy color is red. Sadly, they both go with my signature black pieces, kind of like the above look with the black leggings/pants and boots. I don’t have very many shrugs, but I do like that one.
I love hot pink and it’s a happy colour for me as well Imogen 🙂 although I tend to wear it more as an accent – in accessories or mixed in a pattern – due to my Jessica Rabbit kind of proportions, especially in the chest area. I used to have a pair of hot pink patent leather ballet flats that I loved dearly, can’t wear ballet flats anymore but if I can find hot pink wedge heels here… :p. In the meantime I pour my hot pink love into the jewelry I make as often as I can.
Another happy colour for me is yellow, but that’s a very narrow sweet spot when it comes to me wearing it… ‘true’ yellows but with a lot of white in them ( a pale to bright lemon yellow, as in lemon peel) or I look ill. I usually frame it with charcoal, navy blue – or with a lot of teal especially in summer -.
If we are talking clothing I feel comfortable wearing column of colours featuring other favourite hues of mine like teal, royal blue, electric blue, hunter green, burgundy/oxblood, or the ever-elusive hard-to-find medium-dark cold greys and charcoals as neutrals. I’m a very pale-skinned (but with some pink) dark brunette and high contrast, jewel tones or bright tints tend to work best on me on top of claiming most of my personal preference. Black is for my bad days or for the Snow White Femme Fatale days, no middle ground there – dramatic streak! with some scarlet red in case -.
Recap: pink (hot to salmon pink… the latter occasionally stretching into ‘orange-yet-not’) turquoise blue, bright purples and yellow are my happy perky colours but I feel like I have to limit how much space they’re claiming in my outfit so to spaek . Teal and light cold greens are my happy balance colours (energizing yet ‘comfort zone’=relaxed&relaxing, at ease, confident, nurturing) while burgundy reds and electric blue are my happy mature sexy colours, these four I can wear even head to toe and mix with abandon in spite of medieval dyes taboos :p.
Like Eli, I love those Jewel colours. I love red purples and blue based purples currently (think amethyst and tanzanites) emerald green and cobalt blue. Love them in combinations in the same outfit too. Hot pink used to be a favourite and I still wear it a bit (being a ’80s teen/young woman) though I prefer raspberry more now. I like burgundy and blue reds too.
I also rarely wear yellow, but recently made a lemon yellow skirt which makes me happy when I look at it. An old favorite skirt was lemon yellow with hot pink lilies and I still wear that occasionally.
Wear your happy colours I say, don’t care if orange is the new black…
I adore lemon yellow, the exact color of lemon peel. I’ve loved it for years even though it’s not my best color. When I wear it or even look at it I feel joyous, elated, hopeful and very happy!
You’re right…that color is fantastic on you! I feel like many colors make me happy–usually the bright ones, but sometimes even the pastel ones! There is so much psychology with color that it often surprises me that so many women live in black! jodie
http://www.jtouchofstyle.com
Some women who are tiny, soft and girlie looking end up feeling like clowns in bright colours. Add short legs and the while thing looks stupid. I like black with one bold colour…I feel stupid in brights alone. Imogen looks stunning in it.
melon and coral are what draw my eye but they need black! Sorry girls.
Actually melon and coral look much better with a Marine (warm) navy, or a beautiful chocolate than black.
Brown eyes, brown hair, neutral skin and chocolate… Ends up looking like I’m all brown. It does look nice with blue to but not on me.
It’s a nice happy compute despite its companion of choice
I’m not saying wear brown head to toe – but it’s a great neutral – and I think it looks gorgeous on people who have brown eyes and hair – check out https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/564x/c2/68/f3/c268f3c6b7f29d85ae556499f3b1065b.jpg
*colour*
And makes me feel
Like my skin glows healthily
Not everyone suits bright colours – that’s to do with your colouring not your size. It’s all about the shapes and proportions. There are ways to make your legs look longer – you can wear a skirt rather than pants, you can be careful of your proportions of your garments, you can wear a column of colour to elongate.
There are several colors that make me feel ebullient and also look good on me: emerald green, teal, capri blue, imperial purple, honeysuckle, and dark chocolate. However, there’s also one that brightens my mood whenever I see it, but which I look awful wearing: a hue between lemon and sunflower yellow, but maybe closer to sunflower… I still get away with wearing it on occasion in smaller proportions, or with colors that suit me well closer to my face. (The hues I favor are just a tad on the cool side of neutral, so the yellow still looks good with them). There’s a softer (tinted) yellow that seems to work better for me to wear on a regular basis.
My thrifting expeditions of late have been turning up lots of items in my happy colors, so I was able to wear a plethora of happy colors for four days in a row before resorting to other neutrals this week. My decor is slowly being converted to incorporate more and more of my happy colors, as well. (It’s definitely too bright for some, but the dark chocolate and off-white tone things down…)
My happy colour is definitely orange. It makes me look and feel warm and vibrant.
In fact, warm is the main word I would use to describe my personality, my dress style, my home…
It’s the adjective people most often use to describe me, but it’s very much my dominant physical feature, too (I have naturally tanned, yellow-toned skin, orangey-hazel eyes and coppery/auburn hair!). And I ALWAYS get compliments when I wear anything orange-based 🙂
Looking at photos of myself has been pretty revolutionary for me in terms of discovering what actually looks good on me, as opposed to what I’m drawn to. I’m always heading for the black or black-and-white stripes items in stores, but I can see that I look best in lavender and pale turquoise (larimar might be closer), especially when worn close to the face. I’ve been a life-long victim of the mentality that black is safer, but black puts a shadow under the chin, as Imogen has said, and doesn’t work as well as colors or forgiving shades of white/cream for complimenting skin tone.
I love that you’re seeing which colours make you look vibrant and alive!
My happy color or one that I’ve always been drawn to is periwinkle. I love blues and purples, but when they meet together it makes me feel magical.
Imogen, WOW! is all I can say about the photo of you in the pink top, black pants and black-and-white shrug. That is one of the best combos I’ve ever seen on you. It seems very wintery, though I’ve noticed of late you’ve lightened up your colors. You still rock more wintry colors, though. For some reason, this evokes a real wheeee!!!! in me, and I’m not quite sure why. Really admire it, though.
Yes these colours are more “winter” It’s a dramatic look – and I think that this is where personal preferences come in as well. I still enjoy wearing some of my Dramatic colours, but also am adapting to my new Sublime palette too – as I have shiny skin, I can wear brighter colours better than some!