Deep Autumn Color Palette

The Deep Autumn color palette

The Deep Autumn color palette has 30 warm shades, most of them medium-deep to deep with medium chroma, from espresso and chocolate to deep teal and rust; cream and camel are its lighter neutrals and saffron its lightest accent. A color season describes colors by three separate qualities. Value is how light or dark a color is. Hue is how warm or cool it is. Chroma is how saturated it is. Deep Autumn colors are deep in value and warm in hue, with medium chroma: richer than Soft Autumn colors, softer than Winter colors. Very light colors, like optic white and pastels, sit outside the palette, except cream as a light neutral.

The 8 key colors at the top of this page are the Deep Autumn palette that the selfie analysis in the Wearton phone app uses. The other 22 shades fill out each color family in the same warm, deep, medium-chroma range.

Seasonal color analysis usually recommends warm, deep shades for Deep Autumn, and counts very light or very cool shades as harder to wear near the face. These are styling recommendations, not measured effects on your skin.

Below are 30 reference shades with names and hex codes. A hex code shows how a color looks on a screen. Fabric looks different in different light, so use the swatches as a guide when shopping, not as an exact match.

See the difference

Color analysts test colors with a plain fabric cape under the face, in the same light. Drag the handle to compare powder blue, which is harder to wear for many Deep Autumns, with deep teal from the palette.

Deep teal

Powder blue

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Deep Autumn neutrals and browns

In Deep Autumn, browns replace black and cream replaces white. Espresso, chocolate and tobacco are the dark neutrals, camel is in the middle, and cream is the light one. Warm charcoal is the softest grey. Coats, trousers, boots and bags in these colors go with the rest of the palette.

Deep Autumn greens

Greens are earthy and deep: khaki and moss are the lightest, dark olive and forest green are the everyday greens, and pine is the darkest. Mint, lime and cool emerald are lighter, brighter or cooler than the palette.

Deep Autumn blues and teals

Deep Autumn blues lean green: peacock, dark turquoise, deep teal and petrol. Warm navy, an ink blue with a green cast, is the palette's navy. Powder blue, cobalt and royal blue are lighter or cooler.

Deep Autumn reds and oranges

Reds and oranges are a large family for Deep Autumn. Tomato red and burnt orange are the brightest. Rust and brick red are the earthy middle. Mahogany, oxblood and warm burgundy are the deepest. Pink-based cherry red and neon orange are cooler or brighter than the palette.

Deep Autumn purples and berries

The palette's purples are deep and warm: warm berry, deep plum and aubergine. Lavender, lilac and violet are lighter and cooler.

Deep Autumn yellows and golds

Yellows are golden and deep rather than lemon: saffron, mustard gold, amber and bronze. Pale butter yellow and neon yellow are lighter or brighter than the palette.

Colors to avoid for Deep Autumn

Optic white, blue-black, icy pink, powder blue, fuchsia, cobalt, light cool grey and neon yellow are harder to wear for many Deep Autumns, because they are very light, very cool or very bright. They are not forbidden. Each one has a warmer, deeper version in the palette. If you love one of them, wear it away from the face (trousers, shoes, a bag), in a small amount, or with a palette color between it and your face, such as a camel scarf or a tobacco collar.

• →Optic white → Cream #EFE2C6
• →Blue-black → Espresso #3B2A20
• →Icy pink → Warm berry #7A2E3E
• →Powder blue → Petrol #1F4A57
• →Fuchsia → Deep plum #5B2C47
• →Cobalt → Peacock #0B6470
• →Light cool grey → Camel #A97C4F
• →Neon yellow → Saffron #D4A12A

Can Deep Autumn wear black, navy or white?

Deep Autumn can wear black, navy and white in the right versions: a soft, warm black kept away from the face, a warm navy with an ink or green cast, and cream instead of optic white. Each question below has a short answer first.

Can Deep Autumn wear black?

Yes, Deep Autumn can wear black, but guides disagree on how. Most say cool, blue-toned black is harder near the face than espresso or chocolate, and a few leave black out of the palette. A soft, warm black, like washed black cotton or a matte wool, is closer to the palette than glossy, blue-black fabric. To wear black you love, keep it below the waist, or add a camel, rust or gold layer near your face.

Can Deep Autumn wear navy?

Yes, Deep Autumn can wear a warm navy with a green or ink cast. Bright navy and cool royal blue are further from it. Petrol and deep teal give a similar dark blue look and are in the palette.

Can Deep Autumn wear white?

Optic white is much lighter and cooler than the rest of the palette. Cream and ivory give the same fresh contrast against dark colors. A cream shirt under a chocolate or forest green jacket is a typical Deep Autumn pairing.

Can Deep Autumn wear grey?

Yes, Deep Autumn can wear grey in dark, warm versions: warm charcoal is the palette's grey. Light cool greys and silver-greys are further from the palette; a warm scarf or warm metal jewelry helps if you wear them.

Can Deep Autumn wear pink?

Yes, Deep Autumn can wear pink in deep, warm versions: warm berry, and pinks that lean toward rust or coral. Icy pink and bubble-gum pink are lighter and cooler, and bright fuchsia is cooler and brighter.

Can Deep Autumn wear purple?

Yes, Deep Autumn can wear purple in deep and warm versions: deep plum and aubergine. Lavender, lilac and bright violet are lighter and cooler.

Can Deep Autumn wear pastels?

Pastels are the hardest group for many Deep Autumns, because they are both light and soft. The same hues in deep versions are in the palette: peacock instead of powder blue, warm berry instead of icy pink, saffron instead of pale yellow.

Can Deep Autumn wear silver?

Yes, Deep Autumn can wear silver, especially aged, oxidized or brushed silver. Most guides recommend warm metals for Deep Autumn: antique gold, bronze, brass and copper. Guides count bright, cool, mirror-shiny silver as the hardest metal for Deep Autumn.

Deep Autumn clothing and outfits

Color combinations

Deep Autumn outfits usually look most balanced with some contrast in depth: a dark color next to a lighter one, both warm. Most guides say very low-contrast looks, like one medium color head to toe, are less flattering. A simple formula: one dark neutral, one main color, one light or bright accent.

• Chocolate + Cream + Rust
• Dark olive + Camel + Mustard gold
• Deep teal + Tobacco + Cream
• Oxblood + Camel + Forest green
• Espresso + Burnt orange + Khaki
• Aubergine + Bronze + Cream

Outfit ideas

Four outfits built only from the palette. Under each one are the colors it uses, so you can rebuild it from your own clothes.

A Deep Autumn capsule wardrobe

Twelve pieces in palette colors. The five tops and four bottoms make 20 top-and-bottom combinations, each worn with the boots; the coat and the bag go with all of them.

• Wool coat, camel
• Tailored trousers, espresso
• Silk blouse, cream
• Knit sweater, rust
• Turtleneck, chocolate
• Fine-knit sweater, deep teal
• Shirt, dark olive
• Midi skirt, oxblood
• Straight jeans, warm navy
• Corduroy trousers, moss
• Leather boots, tobacco
• Leather bag, mustard gold

Prints and fabrics

Prints with warm, deep colors and some contrast sit closest to the palette: paisley, tartan in rust and forest green, leopard print in browns, and botanical prints on a dark ground. Pastel florals and black-and-white prints are further from it. Suede, leather, corduroy, tweed and chunky knits are common Deep Autumn fabrics; satin and velvet in deep colors are typical for evening.

Am I a Deep Autumn? How to tell

A season describes how your overall coloring works with color: its depth, how warm or cool it leans, and how soft or clear it looks. It is not tied to one skin depth, ethnicity, eye color or hair color. People with fair, medium and deep skin can all be Deep Autumn.

Skin depth and undertone are different things. Depth is how light or dark the skin is. Undertone is whether it leans golden, pink or neutral. Deep Autumn is about the depth of your overall coloring, hair and eyes included, so a person with fair skin and dark hair and eyes can be Deep Autumn too.

Skin

Any depth, from fair to deep, often with a neutral-to-warm undertone: golden, bronze, olive or caramel rather than pink.

Eyes

Often dark: dark brown, black-brown, deep hazel or dark olive green. Their depth matters more than a particular color.

Hair

Often dark brown, black-brown or dark auburn, with warm tones in daylight. Dyed or grey hair changes the picture, so look at roots, brows and older photos too.

Contrast

Usually medium to high, judged against your own skin depth: dark hair and eyes stand out against the skin and the whites of the eyes.

A side-by-side comparison

Use clothes or fabrics you already own. Sit by a window in daylight, with no makeup or a light base and your hair pulled back. Compare one pair at a time, and change nothing else between them.

1. Depth: a light and a dark version of a similar warm color, such as beige against chocolate.
2. Temperature: a warm and a cool color of similar depth, such as oxblood against a cool wine burgundy.
3. Chroma: a clear and a greyed version of a similar color at similar depth, such as deep teal against a grey-teal.

For each pair, note which one makes your skin look more even and your features more balanced. Taking photos in the same light, or asking a friend, helps. Clothes at home rarely differ in only one quality, so treat the results as a rough guide, not a diagnosis.

If deep, warm and rich win most of the time, Deep Autumn is a reasonable starting point. If deep wins but the cool color looks better, look at Deep Winter. If warm wins and the deep colors look heavy, look at True Autumn. If the dusty colors look better, look at Soft Autumn. Mixed results are common: many people sit near a border between seasons.

Two quick tests are weaker than they seem. Jewelry: many people look fine in both gold and silver, and the finish often matters more than the metal. Selfies: phone cameras adjust white balance and smooth skin, so a photo can shift warmth and contrast. Wearton's selfie analysis is a starting point too; check it against real clothes in daylight.

Deep Autumn vs similar seasons

Deep Autumn shares borders with several seasons, so it is not always clear which one fits. The table compares it with its two neighbors, True Autumn and Deep Winter, and with Soft Autumn, the other autumn season.

The sample colors of each season are the first three colors of the palette the Wearton app uses for it. The table follows the 12-season system. Names differ between systems: Deep Autumn is also called Dark Autumn, Deep Winter is also called Dark Winter, some call True Autumn "Warm Autumn", and 16- or 17-season systems split the seasons further.

Deep Autumn vs Deep Winter

Guides describe both as deep seasons with high contrast, so the difference comes down to temperature. Deep Autumn leans warm: chocolate, rust, dark olive, mustard gold. Deep Winter leans cool: blue-black, cool burgundy, emerald, icy white as an accent.

Compare a rust scarf and a cool burgundy or royal blue scarf of similar depth in daylight. If rust makes your skin look more even, Deep Autumn is more likely; if the cool color does, Deep Winter is more likely. Many people sit close to this border, and both palettes share some deep colors such as deep teal and dark plum.

Deep Autumn vs True Autumn

Both are warm, but True Autumn is the warmest autumn and sits at medium depth: pumpkin, golden olive and true gold. Deep Autumn colors are darker and a little cooler: chocolate instead of camel as the main neutral, oxblood instead of pumpkin. If medium autumn colors look light or flat on you and darker ones look balanced, Deep Autumn is more likely.

Best hair colors for Deep Autumn

Hair color does not decide your season, and you can wear any hair color you like. If you want a color that works with the Deep Autumn palette, warm, deep shades close to your natural depth are the easiest. Ash blonde and platinum are much lighter and cooler than the rest of the palette.

Can Deep Autumns have jet black hair? Yes. Naturally black hair does not rule out Deep Autumn; compare warm and cool fabrics of similar depth rather than deciding from hair color alone. Guides disagree on dyeing hair jet black: some list it among Deep Autumn hair colors, others suggest a warm black-brown or espresso, because blue-black is cooler than the palette. Dark auburn and copper-brown work too. For greying hair, warm lowlights in chestnut or mahogany are one option we suggest; keeping your natural grey is another.

Deep Autumn makeup

Deep Autumn makeup follows the same idea as the clothes: warm, rich and a little deeper than average. The swatches are examples, not one shade for everyone. Choose the depth that matches your skin: a shade that looks rich on fair skin can disappear on deep skin, and a deep shade can look heavy on fair skin.

Lipstick

Fair to light skin: warm caramel nude, brick rose, warm red. Medium skin: brick red, rust, tomato red. Deep skin: oxblood, deep mahogany and warm plum. For a bold lip, a warm tomato or brick red works across depths.

Blush

Fair to light skin: warm peach, soft terracotta. Medium skin: terracotta, burnt coral. Deep skin: deep terracotta, brick and warm berry. Blend it well so it looks like a warm flush.

Eyeshadow and eyeliner

Bronze, copper, olive and espresso work across depths; deeper versions such as dark chocolate and deep bronze show better on deep skin. Espresso, forest green or deep plum eyeliner and brown-black mascara are the usual advice, but black mascara is fine if you prefer it.

Nails

Oxblood, rust, deep teal, forest green or a warm nude matched to your skin depth. A warm cream is softer than optic white.

Jewelry and metals for Deep Autumn

Seasonal color guides recommend warm metals for Deep Autumn: antique or hammered gold, bronze, brass and copper. Most also accept aged, oxidized or brushed silver, mixed with gold; bright, cool, mirror-shiny silver is the hardest metal for Deep Autumn. Stones in palette colors include tiger's eye, garnet, carnelian, amber, smoky quartz and dark jade.

Deep Autumn celebrities

Celebrity seasons are opinions from photos, not facts: lighting, makeup, hair dye and editing change how someone looks, and analysts often disagree. These names appear on two or more published Deep Autumn lists.

• Zendaya
• Halle Berry
• Natalie Portman
• Victoria Beckham
• Leighton Meester
• Eva Mendes

Published lists also name Salma Hayek, Kit Harington and Oscar Isaac, and Idris Elba, whom some analysts type as Deep Winter instead: Deep Autumn is not limited to one skin depth.

Deep Autumn for men

The same palette works for men. Suits and trousers in espresso, chocolate, dark olive, warm navy and warm charcoal give the depth of black with more warmth. For shirts: cream, camel, khaki, rust and deep teal. Brown or oxblood leather, an antique gold or bronze watch and knitwear in forest green or rust complete the palette.

When does autumn start and end?

Weather services in the United States, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Germany, Japan and South Korea count autumn from September 1 to November 30; calendars use the September equinox to the December solstice. In the Southern Hemisphere, autumn starts in March. Some countries use temperature or their own calendars instead (table below). Deep Autumn itself is a color season, not a time of year: you can wear the palette in any month.

The answer depends on the hemisphere, and on which of two definitions your country uses.

Meteorological autumn

Three whole calendar months, used for weather records: September 1 to November 30 in the Northern Hemisphere, March 1 to May 31 in the Southern Hemisphere.

Astronomical autumn

From the equinox to the solstice. The dates move by a day from year to year, and the day can differ by time zone.

Where two days are given, the day depends on your time zone. The Americas can be one day earlier than East Asia and Oceania.

Deep Autumn colors work in every season. In a warm place or a hot month, wear the same colors in linen, cotton and light knits.

Common Deep Autumn mistakes

Typical Deep Autumn mistakes are treating black as the only dark neutral, choosing dusty shades, and wearing outfits with no light or bright part.

1. 1

   Treating black as the only dark neutral

   Black is the dark neutral most people own, but espresso, chocolate and warm navy give the same depth with the warmth of the palette.

   Instead: Espresso, Chocolate, Warm navy

2. 2

   Choosing dusty, greyed colors

   Dusty rose, sage and grey-blue are Soft Autumn and Soft Summer colors. Deep Autumn takes the same hues richer and darker.

   Instead: Warm berry, Dark olive, Petrol

3. 3

   Going too pale

   Optic white and pastels are lighter and cooler than the palette. Its one light neutral is cream.

   Instead: Cream, Camel

4. 4

   Dressing in one medium color head to toe

   Deep Autumn coloring usually has medium to high contrast. An outfit with no dark and no light part can look flat next to it.

   Instead: Chocolate, Cream, Rust

5. 5

   Bright cool silver everywhere

   Mirror-shiny cool silver is the hardest metal for many Deep Autumns. Antique gold, bronze and aged silver sit closer to the palette.

   Instead: Bronze, Mustard gold

6. 6

   Choosing cool, greyish browns

   Taupe and grey-brown with a cool cast are further from the palette than browns with red or gold in them.

   Instead: Tobacco, Chocolate, Camel

7. 7

   Wearing only dark colors

   An outfit of only dark colors has little contrast. A light or bright palette color near the face adds the contrast that most guides recommend for Deep Autumn.

   Instead: Cream, Saffron, Burnt orange

8. 8

   Picking cool, pink-based reds

   Cherry red and raspberry lean blue, so they are cooler than the palette. Deep Autumn reds lean orange or brown.

   Instead: Tomato red, Brick red, Oxblood

Deep Autumn FAQ