Dressing With the Color Wheel

We are all familiar with the color wheel yet few of us look to it for guidance. It can definitively give you an answer about what colors to wear and with what. So, this post is all about how I used it today.

Today I used analogous colors, colors that lie next to each other on the wheel. First, let me explain what forced me to use the color wheel. One of the colorful sweaters I received yesterday was a heather dark bluish-green, someone called it peacock although it isn't the color of peacock feathers. Well, what do you wear with it? I had an idea that green and blue look good together but, what else? What tie should I wear? I just didn't know what to wear.

I referred to the color wheel. Now, I drew a line bisecting the wheel; one side is purple all the way to bright green and the other half is yellow to a purplish-red. Since, I dislike yellow most of the time, I ignored the yellow side. Since, I'm focusing on the purple and green side I started to play around with the colors. Since I have a dark green I know, I have to use bright or lighter colors. So what I did was I said I'll try a purple and a light blue. I put on a blue shirt and immediately moved on to the tie. It didn't look good wearing a solid purple tie; my plumb and bright colored purple both looked strange. Next I thought how about a geometric using a purple as a significant color. This approach worked much better because I landed on the tie I decided to wear. It is a checked pattern with a dark purple, a bright purple, a light blue, and a navy repeating check.

Using my methodology wont guarantee success. Like I did, you have to play around with it. You also need to use the basic skills you learned about dressing, such as contrast, scale, and the rules. Also you'll never have the exact colors you have on the wheel. This is neither desirable nor a disadvantage. It just means you have to use your imagination and slant the colors to fit what you have in your closet. Now you have no reason you can't wear something that is a hard color to coordinate with. Seriously it isn't very hard to do.

Good Luck!!!