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Sister Seasons in Color Analysis

  • 1 day ago
  • 3 min read

Today, we're diving into a super cool concept that can be the final piece of the puzzle in finding your perfect palette: Sister Seasons!


What Even ARE Sister Seasons?

The 12-season color analysis system is based on three main characteristics:


  • Temperature: Cool vs Warm. Are you naturally Cool (blue-based undertones) or Warm (yellow/golden-based undertones)?

  • Depth: Light vs Dark. Is your overall coloring Light (delicate, airy) or Dark (rich, intense)? This refers to the value of your features.

  • Chroma: Bright vs Muted. Do you suit Bright (clear, vivid, saturated) colors or Muted (soft, subdued, blended) colors? This describes the clarity or intensity of your natural palette.


From these three, we get 12 possible combinations, which can be divided into four main groups: Summer, Winter, Spring and Autumn.


You’re Sister Season is the season that shares the same primary characteristic as your season.


The Kindred Color Families


Temperature-Based Seasons



The Warm Seasons: True Spring and True Autumn 


The Cool Seasons: True Winter and True Summer 


Chroma-Based Seasons



The Bright Seasons: Bright Winter and Bright Spring


The Muted Seasons: Soft Summer and Soft Autumn


Depth-Based Seasons



The Light Seasons: Light Spring and Light Summer


The Dark Seasons: Deep Autumn and Deep Winter


How Sister Seasons Help You Pinpoint Your Palette

Finding your sister season can be a great way to finally nail down your home season or to confirm it. It’s especially important if you’re still stuck between two or three seasons.


Let’s say you’re pretty sure you’re a Summer. You’ve noticed that you look best in colors that are cool-toned, light and muted, but you’re not quite sure if you’re a Light Summer, True Summer or Soft Summer. One way to help you find your home season would be to test out colors from each sister season, so Light Spring, True Winter and Soft Autumn.


To pinpoint your exact home season, you can strategically test out colors from the sister seasons that share your dominant characteristics. For a potential Summer, this might involve exploring:


  • Light Spring (shares Lightness with Light Summer)

  • True Winter (shares Coolness with True Summer)

  • Soft Autumn (shares Softness/Mutedness with Soft Summer)


You’ll often find that that once of these will look far better than the others. Sometimes you can think you fall into a certain season, but when you try out the colors from the sister season, they just look off. This most likely means, that is not your season. 


How to Wear Colors from Your Sister Season


Knowing your sister season does not only help you narrow down your own season, but you can also use these colors in your wardrobe. These are colors that can give you an extra pop. They might not be 100% in harmony with you as your home season is, but sometimes we might not want 100% harmony. Sometimes we want our fashion choices to stick out and contrast more with our appearance. Sister seasons are great for that.


Let’s say you’re a True Summer and your best colors are cool, muted and light. You might want to wear something a little brighter to stand out sometimes, and True Winter colors like cobalt, magenta and red are great for that. Or vice versa, as a True Winter, you might want something softer and instead opt for a muted blue, or mauve. 


Sister Season colors are also great for accessories like bags, shoes, belts and jewelry. 


Knowing your Sister Season gives you a broader array of colors to play with!

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