Soft Summer hair color

Muted summer hair color

Muted Summer is simply another label for Soft Summer, so everything here applies to both. This palette is cool and softened, full of greyed, gentle colors that flatter low contrast, softly colored people. When we say low contrast, we mean your hair, skin and eyes sit close together in lightness, with no big jumps between them.

The season sits at a medium depth and runs neutral to cool. Softness is its defining quality, with coolness close behind. That's the reason good hair colors here look smoky instead of glossy or loud.

Natural hair in this season

Plenty of people in this season were born with ashy dark blonde hair that has no golden glow to it. Others grow light to medium mouse brown, a soft shade that's neither warm nor deep.

If your coloring runs deeper, natural hair often turns out a cool medium brown touched with ash. At its darkest, it becomes a soft charcoal brown that reads more like muted black than real jet black.

Decoding dye labels and salon talk

Dye labels talk about two things: depth (the light-to-dark scale) and tone (the warm-to-cool scale). Three tone words show up again and again:

• Ash: smoky and cool, with no yellow or red in it. This is your best match.
• Golden: warm and honeyed. It usually fights cool skin.
• Neutral: the middle ground of the temperature scale. When ash feels too flat, a neutral that leans cool will do.

Dye shades that keep you in season

Every shade here stays cool and muted, so it works with your skin instead of against it.

• Mushroom brown melts into cool, muted skin without any effort.
• Dark ash blonde keeps lighter hair soft and free of brassy yellow.
• Cool medium brown gives you gentle depth that never feels heavy.
• Soft charcoal brown flatters deeper skin far better than flat jet black.

If a deeper shade is what you're after, soft charcoal brown is the wiser route. Real black drains the color from your face and emphasizes the hollows beneath your eyes.

Adding lighter pieces

An ashy taupe take on highlights breaks up a flat, all-over color with a gentle, natural fade. It brings movement to the hair while the overall look stays cool and quiet.

Balayage is hand-painted color rather than the neat rows you get with foils. Request it in an ashy taupe and you'll get that blended, soft effect that low contrast coloring loves.

What to ask your colorist for

Plain, direct language helps your colorist mix the right formula. Say these things out loud at the start of your appointment:

• Request an ash or cool tone, and make it clear you want nothing golden or honey.
• Point to a shade from your list, like mushroom brown or dark ash blonde.
• If you want lighter pieces, ask for highlights in an ashy taupe.
• Let them know that yellow gold, orange and bright yellow leave your complexion looking sallow, so they understand why warmth works against you.

Colors that won't do you any favors

The shades below fight your soft, cool coloring, either through warmth or through too much contrast.

• Jet black dye, which leaves your skin looking drained.
• Golden blonde or honey highlights, which fight cool skin.
• Bright copper, auburn or warm reds, which overwhelm soft features.
• Bleach platinum blonde, which is harsher than your gentle coloring can carry.

Loud colors tend to wear the person, so the hair gets noticed before the face. The same goes for bright neon clothing in this season.

Letting grey come in

Silver grey sits comfortably within the Soft Summer palette and welcomes grey in gently. It matches the metals that flatter you most, brushed silver and pewter, both of which rest easily against your skin.

Since natural hair here usually leans ashy and smoky anyway, grey strands blend easily with your natural shade.