Deep Autumn

Warm · deep · rich

Warm and deep, usually with dark hair against warm skin. Colours need weight — pale ones wash out beside you.

The Deep Autumn palette

  • Oxblood
  • Dark gold
  • Pine
  • Walnut
  • Burnt umber
  • Deep olive
  • Sienna
  • Damson

Neutrals

  • Warm bone
  • Tobacco
  • Dark chocolate

Three that fight it

  • Pastel pink
  • Powder blue
  • Greige

Three, not thirty. A palette is a prediction about which tones lift your face, not a list of banned colours — and a long avoid-list is the fastest way to make a useful idea useless.

What makes a Deep Autumn

Deep Autumn is warm colouring carried at depth: dark hair against skin with a golden or olive cast, and eyes usually dark brown or deep hazel. Depth is the defining axis, warmth the family. Pale colours do not so much clash as evaporate — they sit next to the face without registering.

Am I a Deep Autumn?

Depth first, temperature second.

  • Dark chocolate brown and deep olive should look better on you than any pastel, without effort.
  • Then decide temperature: if deep warm colours work and deep cool ones look slightly severe, you are the autumn side rather than the winter one.
  • Cream and warm bone should beat optic white; if optic white wins, you are Deep Winter.

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Deep Autumn versus the seasons it is confused with

  • Deep Winter

    Temperature, and it is the whole question. Both are deep; Deep Winter's skin has a cool or neutral cast and takes true black, Deep Autumn's is golden and prefers espresso to black.

  • True Autumn

    Depth. If mid-range rusts suit you better than near-black browns, you are True rather than Deep.

Deep Autumn makeup

Depth and warmth together; this season can carry a strong lip easily.

  • Deep terracotta and warm plum blush
  • Espresso, deep olive, bronze and warm aubergine on the eye
  • Dark brown or deep bronze liner; black is workable but reads cooler than the season
  • Oxblood, deep brick and warm burgundy on the lip

Hair colour for a Deep Autumn

Dark chocolate, deep auburn, black-brown with a warm cast. Lightening this season is the expensive mistake — the depth is a large part of what the palette is built on.

Gold or silver?

Antiqued and yellow gold, bronze. Silver is possible in an oxidised finish but never as the main note.

How do I know if I am a Deep Autumn?

Depth first, temperature second. Dark chocolate brown and deep olive should look better on you than any pastel, without effort. Then decide temperature: if deep warm colours work and deep cool ones look slightly severe, you are the autumn side rather than the winter one. Cream and warm bone should beat optic white; if optic white wins, you are Deep Winter.

What colours suit a Deep Autumn?

Oxblood, Dark gold, Pine, Walnut, Burnt umber and similar tones, with warm bone, tobacco, dark chocolate as the neutrals that carry them.

Should a Deep Autumn wear gold or silver?

Antiqued and yellow gold, bronze. Silver is possible in an oxidised finish but never as the main note.

What hair colour suits a Deep Autumn?

Dark chocolate, deep auburn, black-brown with a warm cast. Lightening this season is the expensive mistake — the depth is a large part of what the palette is built on.

Deep Autumn or Deep Winter?

Temperature, and it is the whole question. Both are deep; Deep Winter's skin has a cool or neutral cast and takes true black, Deep Autumn's is golden and prefers espresso to black.

Deep Autumn or True Autumn?

Depth. If mid-range rusts suit you better than near-black browns, you are True rather than Deep.

The other eleven seasons

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