Wearing a color I don’t usually wear

At the beginning of the year I resolved to work on one vintage resolution per month.

So far I have gotten my clothes closet organized and fun to visit, and I have discovered the vintage lounge wear that I love. This month I am going to wear a color I don’t usually wear.

Yes, I am fairly aware of the colors that work well on me and make good use of those as often as I can. I do think, though, that I could see what happens with some colors that I am not so used to wearing.

I have the feeling part of the reason I don’t wear certain shades is prejudice. For instance, if I could choose a brown coat or a green coat, I wouldn’t even look before choosing the green. Why am I giving brown the shove-off?

I did a small (last time I looked it was up to 54 people) highly unscientific survey of Facebook followers and found that among the respondents, the favorite color to wear is blue, tied with black, 15% each, followed closely by pink.

87% of people like to wear their favorite color, in other words, the color they choose to look at also translates to wearing the color.

Yellow is the big “winner” of colors that people don’t like to wear...24% of respondents named it. The biggest reason for not wearing a color is that they feel it makes them look ill or washed out. Often mentioned was the way a color clashed with the person’s skin tone.

34% of the people responding were wearing black at the time they took the survey.

Many respondents made it clear that there are very specific shades of color that do and don’t work for them. Almost nobody named blue alone, but usually qualified it. Aqua and turquoise were most liked by 35% of the blue fanciers. The style of the item being worn made a difference that some articulated and if in a print, some said they would definitely accept even poor-old yellow!

A few people mentioned dislikes of colors for social reasons, like pink being too stereotypically “girly,” and brown and navy evoking small-mindedness for another respondent.

Which do you think you’d prefer, a 1940s green gabardine coat or a 1970s brown velvet wrap coat? If you are like me, you’d have all kind of prejudices for the 40s coat, but when I compare these two from my previously-sold photos, I think the brown makes a pretty good case for itself:

Which of these coat do you think I’d be searching for by keywords online, and which would I reject almost out of hand from a written description?

You know those colors by season, colors meant to highlight and enhance your own natural color?

Did you know all but one of the types listed (soft summer, clear winter, deep autumn, etc.) includes at least one yellow? Many brown and brown-ish shades are also listed.

I confess, I have had my color season told to me by an expert. In 1981 my mother had a large piece of green silk satin brocade, a gift from a friend from Japan. She just wasn’t convinced I would look good in something made of it, and she was dedicated to having it go for the right purpose. She may have also been wanting to support a friend who was doing this color reading...I suspect that may have been most of it.

At that much younger time I was a bit tricky, but was declared a winter. I think it is time to reconsider.

...next time.