SpecFitBest glasses colours for a warm skin tone
Warm undertone skin has a golden or yellow base under it, at any depth from fair to deep. Frames with the same golden base look natural on you. Frames from the cool side can look harsh. This guide covers the warm side in full: which colours to shop, which to pick with care, and how to check on your own face.
Undertone is not skin colour
Two people with very different skin depths can share the same undertone, and two people with the same depth can have different ones. As covered in what colour glasses suit me, undertone is the base colour underneath the skin, not how light or dark it is.
Four checks point to a warm undertone. The veins on the inside of your wrist look green rather than blue. Gold jewellery flatters your skin more than silver does. Your skin tans in the sun rather than burning. Hold a plain white sheet of paper next to your face in daylight: warm skin looks yellow or golden against it, not pink.
The colours that work
Warm skin takes any frame with a yellow, brown, or golden base. The most useful ones, roughly in order of how often they work:
- Gold. The clearest warm metal. It sits close to the skin's own base tone.
- Honey or amber tortoise. The single most reliable colour here, because it carries several warm tones at once.
- Brown and olive. Quiet, natural, and hard to get wrong.
- Cream and honey acetate. Softer than tortoise, good for low-contrast colouring.
- Copper and bronze. A warmer, deeper alternative to plain gold.
- Warm burgundy and warm red. A brick or rust-based red rather than a cherry or berry one.
- Khaki. An unusual but dependable choice on warm skin.
Colours to pick with care
Pure silver, icy grey, stark black, cool blue, and cool pink are not forbidden. They are simply from the other side of the wheel, so they can read a little harsher against golden skin than a warm colour does. Black is the one worth a note of its own: it still works if you want the contrast, but choose a matte or warm brown-black over a shiny jet black. The shine and the coolness together are what fight golden skin, not the darkness alone.
Every classic colour has a warm version
You rarely need to give up a shape or a colour family. You need the warm version of it. The table below gives the swap for the four families that come up most.
| Colour family | Warm version to pick | Cool version to skip |
|---|---|---|
| Tortoise | Honey or amber tortoise | Black-and-grey tortoise |
| Metal | Gold or bronze | Silver or gunmetal |
| Clear or crystal | Champagne or honey crystal | Clear or grey crystal |
| Red | Brick or rust | Cherry or berry |
Contrast decides how bold to go
Undertone tells you the family of colours to shop. Contrast, the gap between your skin and your hair, tells you how bold within that family. High-contrast colouring, such as dark hair on light skin, carries a bold, dark frame well, so dark brown or dark tortoise reads as deliberate. Low-contrast colouring, where hair sits close to skin tone, is easier to overwhelm, so a softer mid-tone frame like honey tortoise or light brown keeps the balance.
Hair and eye colour shift the choice a little further. Warm skin paired with red or golden hair is very warm overall, so gold and amber frames look their best. Warm skin paired with black hair sits at higher contrast, and can take a dark brown or dark tortoise frame instead of a lighter one.
The two-frame test
Hold a warm frame, such as honey tortoise, and a cool frame, such as silver, against your face in daylight, one after the other. The one that makes your skin look even and rested is the right family. The other one tends to make the same skin look tired or sallow by comparison. This takes seconds and settles most doubts faster than reading about undertone does.
SpecFit reads your undertone from the scan. The face scan uses your iPhone's depth camera to measure your PD, face width, and bridge width in real millimetres, accurate to about 1 mm. It also tags frames warm or cool based on your undertone. The fit check is free: paste a link to any glasses and the app reads the size stamp and scores the fit against your face. Rendering a frame on your face costs one credit.
Questions
How do I know if I have a warm undertone?
Check the veins on the inside of your wrist in daylight. If they look green, you are likely warm. Gold jewellery flatters warm skin more than silver does, and warm skin tans rather than burns. Any skin depth, light to deep, can be warm.
What colour glasses suit golden or yellow-based skin?
Gold, honey or amber tortoise, brown, olive, cream, copper, and warm burgundy. These share the same yellow base as golden skin, so the frame reads as part of the face instead of sitting on top of it.
Can a warm undertone wear black glasses?
Yes, if you want contrast. Choose a matte or warm brown-black over a shiny jet black. A shiny black or an icy grey can read a little harsher against golden skin than a warm brown-black does.
Is tortoiseshell a warm or cool colour?
It can be either. Honey and amber tortoise are warm. Black-and-grey tortoise is cool. The pattern is the same; the base colour underneath it decides which undertone it suits.