Soft Summer makeup

What makes gentle, greyed tones work for you?

When contrast is low, your skin, hair and eyes are all fairly close in how light or dark they are. Bold makeup sits on top of that and gets noticed before you do. Vivid neon shades end up wearing you, much like a shouting shirt would.

Dusty rose and sage help this coloring look even and well rested. Warm orange and bright yellow can leave your face looking sallow or washed out. Pure black can pull the life out of your skin and highlight the shadows beneath your eyes.

Finish and intensity

Because your coloring is soft, shades that melt into your skin tend to work better than ones that sit there as a solid block of color. A sheer wash, or color built up lightly, keeps things soft. Your palette does have one shimmer, pewter shimmer, which lends the eyes a low-key glow that sits nicely with the brushed silver and pewter metals made for you.

Deeper shades are still allowed. Soft berry, muted plum and deep slate all appear in your list. You're after smoky, greyed depth rather than color that turns bright or sharp.

Soft Summer lipstick

Cool and dusty is the base shared by every lipstick here. The five to know are dusty rose, rose mauve, soft berry, muted plum and rosewood.

For an easy daily lip, dusty rose and rosewood are your friends, being the softest of the bunch. Rose mauve brings in a little more color while staying quiet. When evening calls for something bolder, soft berry and muted plum are the deepest options.

Skip warm orange, coral and peach lipsticks, because warm tones fight cool coloring. Gloss in vivid neon pink or fiery red is also too much for this gentle look.

Blush, eyeshadow, eyeliner and nails

Every area of the face gets its own small shade range, so you can combine them any way you like.

For blush, keep it light with soft rose pink or dusty mauve, or go deeper with muted berry or cool rose brown.

On the lids, everyday choices are mushroom grey, soft taupe and dusty lilac, while the evening picks are pewter shimmer and deep slate.

To line the eyes, cool ash brown and charcoal grey work by day, and smoky plum is the deeper option.

For nails, choose from greige, sage green, dusty lavender and soft wine.

These two, charcoal grey and cool ash brown, define the eyes without black's hard edge. Smoky plum is a gentler dark with just a hint of color in it.

An easy everyday look

For daytime, four products are plenty:

1. Dust soft taupe or mushroom grey over your eyelids for subtle shape.
2. Run cool ash brown along your upper lashes to define the eyes gently.
3. A little soft rose pink or dusty mauve on the cheeks gives a fresh, gentle glow.
4. Then a dusty rose or rosewood lip completes the look.

Going deeper after dark

When the sun goes down, you can build a richer look without reaching for black or bright red.

1. Tap pewter shimmer onto the middle of your eyelids for a soft glow.
2. Deepen the outer corners with deep slate for extra dimension.
3. Line your lashes in smoky plum or charcoal grey.
4. Sweep muted berry or cool rose brown across your cheeks.
5. Choose a soft berry or muted plum lip.

Shades to leave out of your kit

• Liquid liner in jet black, which reads as too harsh against gentle lashes
• Lipsticks in warm orange, coral or peach
• Heavy bronzer in golden or orange tones
• Lip gloss in bright neon pink or fiery red

All of these add either warmth or a lot of brightness, and both work against cool, muted coloring. The same rule applies to clothes and accessories in gold, royal blue, fuchsia, true red, sunflower and Kelly green at full brightness.