There is no shade that suits everybody and no shade that suits nobody. What there is, is a relationship between the colour and your undertone, and once you know it you can walk past ninety percent of a lipstick display without stopping.
Find your undertone first
Look at the veins on the inside of your wrist in daylight. Blue or purple means cool. Green or olive means warm. If you cannot tell, you are neutral and everything is easier for you.
Then follow the colour
- Cool undertones look best in blue based reds, berry, plum, raspberry, true pink, cool mauve.
- Warm undertones look best in orange based reds, coral, brick, terracotta, warm brown, peach.
- Neutral can wear either, and true red, rose and most nudes are safe in every direction.
Nude is the hard one
A nude that matches your lips exactly makes you look tired, because it erases the only natural colour on your face. Go one or two shades deeper than your natural lip, not lighter. A nude that is too pale is the most common lipstick mistake there is.
Texture changes the colour
The same pigment reads completely differently depending on finish. Matte looks a shade deeper and more serious. Gloss looks lighter and softer. A stain sits closest to your own lip colour and is the most forgiving thing to wear when you are not going to look in a mirror again for six hours.
If a shade feels too much in matte, the same shade in a gloss is usually the one you actually wanted.
Make it last
Fill the entire lip with liner first, not just the outline. Apply colour, blot with a tissue, apply again. That is it. Two thin layers with a blot between them outlast one thick layer by hours.
The full lip range runs from balm to liner to matte stain.
