Which Winter are you? Differentiating the three Winter color seasons

In high school, after diagnosing my color season as Winter, I strove to purge all traces of yellow and orange from my wardrobe. The climax of my obsession occurred when I refused to be on the Orange Team in gym class, because I’d have to wear an orange jersey.

Aside from its unbridled vanity, my orange-phobia was misguided also because Winters do look harmonious in cool-toned versions of stereotypically warm colors, including orange and yellow.

We can also divide the broad color season of Winter into three subtypes—and two of those subtypes have warm influence from Spring and Autumn.

The differences between these three Winter subtypes can be extremely subtle. So this post provides visual examples of celebrities who fall into each subtype, with the aim of making it easier to understand which type is yours.

The Winter subtypes

Regardless of subtype, Winters’ best colors have an intense and regal vibe—they’re cool, bright, and range from very light to very dark.

True Winter

True Winters are pure Winters with very cool skin tones. They’re harmonious in very cool and fairly bright colors.

Bright Winter

Bright Winters have neutral-cool skin tones—they’re Winters with Spring influence.

This makes Bright Winter’s colors overall a bit warmer, lighter, and brighter than True Winter’s.

Dark Winter

Dark Winters also have neutral-cool skin tones—they’re Winters with Autumn influence.

This makes Dark Winter’s colors overall a bit warmer, softer, and darker than True Winter’s.

As seen above, the distinctions between these subtypes’ harmonious colors can be extremely subtle, which explains why determining your color season can be so challenging.

Below are celebrity examples of each type to help visualize the differences.

True Winter celebrities

This is Winter in its purest form—True Winter skin often lacks obvious warmth and can have an icy quality.

Examples of True Winter celebrities include Alexis Bledel, Katy Perry, Duckie Thot, and Krysten Ritter.

Some people consider Alexis (far left) and Krysten (far lower right) to be Bright Winter, so I’m going to include Bright Winters Jennifer Connelly, Megan Fox, and Lupita Nyong’o directly beneath them for comparison.

"Erica and Alexis Bledel" by eschipul is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.

Photo credit: "Katy Perry" by ellasportfolio is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.

Photo credit: "Duckie Thot a 01" by win autoclip is licensed under CC BY 4.0.

"Krysten Ritter" by Gage Skidmore is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.

Bright Winter celebrities: Winter with Spring

"Jennifer Connelly 2010 TIFF" by Karon Liu at https://www.flickr.com/people/32153970@N07 is licensed under CC BY 2.0.

"Megan Fox" by gdcgraphics is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.

"Lupita Nyong'o, by Gordon Correll" by gdcgraphics is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.

Bright Winters have primarily cool undertones, but also some warm undertones. So, their skin appears warmer than True Winters’.

As seen above, compared to Bright Winters Jennifer Connelly, Megan Fox, and Lupita Nyong’o, True Winters Alexis Bledel and Krysten Ritter have notably cooler skin tones.

You could argue it’s the lighting, but even in warm lighting, I don’t think Krysten Ritter harmonizes well with the Bright Winters:

Even artificial yellowy lighting doesn’t really make Krysten Ritter look harmonious with the Bright Winters. She just looks like a Cool Winter in yellow lighting.

I’ve also seen Jennifer Connelly typed as True Winter rather than Bright, but you can see above (and virtually draped here) that she’s more harmonious with the Bright Winters and in a bright pink lip.

And you can see below that even without a tan, her skin isn’t as starkly cool as the True Winters’ (though ignore her Autumny lip color):

Part of the reason why it’s so tricky to distinguish between True and Bright Winter is because they are quite similar, and because True Winters do look harmonious in bright colors—it’s just that Bright Winters look harmonious in even brighter colors.

In my view, to determine a person’s color season, virtual draping is the most important step, but it can also help to compare their skin tone directly to people who have similar seasons.

Doing this enables us see that it seems at least questionable that Alexis and Krysten would be Bright while Jennifer would be True, because Jennifer appears markedly warmer than they are.

Here’s some celebrities whose skin has a different kind of warm influence:

Dark Winter celebrities: Winter with Autumn

"Anne Hathaway Face" by Mireille Ampilhac is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.

"Keira 'Five Times' Knightley" by Potatojunkie is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.

"Natalie Portman Cannes 2015 4" by Georges Biard is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.

People seem to generally agree that Anne Hathaway and Keira Knightley are Dark Winters. Natalie Portman I’ve seen typed as Dark Autumn, but that doesn’t fit with what I observe here. In what appears to be natural outdoor lighting, and without highlighted hair as a distraction, you can see Natalie appears more harmonious with these Dark Winters than with, say, Dark Autumn Kim Kardashian:

"Kim Kardashian 6" by Luke Ford is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.5.

The distinction is admittedly subtle. As a Dark Winter, Natalie is a Winter with Autumn influence. As a Dark Autumn, Kim is an Autumn with Winter influence. And typing them here is made harder by the fact that they’re all wearing makeup.

On Pinterest, I post what to the best of my knowledge are makeup free photos of these celebrities, so that more accurate comparisons can be made.

More on Color Season

Future posts will discuss the other seasons, how to combine your color season and style type, and how your color season could make it harder to accurately identify your style essences.