When considering colors for yourself in terms of permanent makeup or really anything, such as clothing, jewelry, makeup or accessories, one should really consider the undertones of your coloring. Your skin tone or undertone, doesn’t really relate to the shade of your skin (light, medium or dark) that is your complexion or the surface color of your skin. Your skin tone is determined by the amount of pigment or melanin in your skin and does not change from exposure to the sun, like when you’re really tan or from a skin condition such as Rosacea. Even if you’re milk white in the middle of winter or you’re a bronzed gold before that trip to the Caribbean, your skin tone remains the same.
Skin tones are referred to as either cool, warm or neutral. This does not reflect how your skin looks on the surface. If you look at the veins on the inside of your wrist, this is a good indicator of your skin tone. If those veins appear more blue than green, you’re cool toned. A celebrity example would be Cameron Diaz. Cool tones usually look best in silver colored jewelry and primary colors look really great on them. If your veins appear green, then you’re warm toned. Think Jessica Biel with her warm coloring. Earth tones and yellow gold make you look fabulous! If it is hard to tell what color those veins are, you could be neutral toned. Think Jennifer Aniston. She is a good example of a neutral tone, which means basically anything looks great on her! Good for you if you have this coloring. The world is your oyster!
In terms of permanent makeup, it’s important for your technician to know what undertone you have so that she can help you choose a pigment that will flatter your natural coloring. If a person has a cool undertone, a true red in terms of lip shade can have a funky blue color to it once it heals, so your technician will need to add some warmth to the color so it heals the way it should. There are numerous shades of black, in terms of eyeliner, so picking a black that will heal a true black is important based on your skin tone. Choosing pigment colors is not always a perfect science but an experienced technician knows how to adjust the process to get you the color you’re looking for.