Be Intentional About the Contrast in Your Outfits

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Angie is co-founder of YLF and its resident fashion stylist.

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Outfits Ensembles Trends Advice

Be Intentional About the Contrast in Your Outfits

— by Angie

on February 21, 2024

There are many ways to create contrast in your outfits. Between the clothing items, between the items and your footwear or accessories. Between all of those things and your skin tone. And you can create contrast within the patterns on items.

White jeans with black shoes for high contrast. White jeans with silver shoes for low contrast. White jeans and black shoes look vivid, graphic, and striking with a black top. White jeans and silver shoes look pretty, soft, and streamlined with a pastel top.

When an outfit looks off, try adjusting the contrast between its components. Consider the items, footwear, accessories and your own colouring. Use high contrast to draw attention to components, and low contrast to blend them in.

Style Nuggets

35 comments · Add a comment

Forum conversations about this post

Choosing a Beanie — by Vicki

Dee

Veteran

I’ve always felt the need for some contrast in my look, I like this graphic punch to help keep my outfit looking crisp, otherwise I feel a bit dowdy in what I’m wearing.

February 21, 2024 at 4:48 am

April

Veteran

I enjoy both so I’m glad we’re not choosing teams!

February 21, 2024 at 5:03 am

Greta

Great topic. I need contrast, otherwise it looks off.

February 21, 2024 at 5:29 am

Helena

Veteran

Such a great tip … I enjoy and gravitate to a bit of contrast but am learning to be intentional about *where* it is in my outfit … So I’m highlighting what I want to highlight and not what I don’t

February 21, 2024 at 5:33 am

Indigoprint

Veteran

I love seeing high contrast outfits and have saved many images. However low contrast works best for my coloring, even within my “best” colors, so I blend in.

February 21, 2024 at 6:26 am

ChristelJ

Veteran

This is a fascinating topic, one I rarely think about consciously. My default is to low contrast because my own coloring is so faded. High contrast often overwhelms me. However, I am realizing that I often wear light tops to make my hair appear darker by contrast. Also, my blacks and whites are carefully chosen to be faded black and soft white so they don’t appear as stark. I guess I create my own set of contrasts that don’t stand out much but don’t let me disappear entirely. I will ponder this more, thank you!

February 21, 2024 at 6:28 am

morethanbeige

Veteran

I find that some days I intentionally pick high contrast and other days low. I enjoy both!

February 21, 2024 at 6:32 am

Sisi

Veteran

Very interesting – thank you Angie! I have never thought of it but now that you make me think I realize that I like both. One of my favourite Summer looks is white pants with a black top, but I also like wearing the same white pants with a pastel top and cream or silver sandals.

February 21, 2024 at 6:35 am

Star

Veteran

I definitely feel more like myself in outfits with high contrast. Soft and pretty makes me look washed out. I thought this would change with my natural silver hair but it has not.

February 21, 2024 at 7:32 am

RobinF

Veteran

I tend to prefer contrast but lately also like monochromatic looks. The in-between (or low contrast?) doesn’t work for me.

February 21, 2024 at 7:46 am

lyn67

Veteran

Yes, contrast is a creative fashion tool to play with! Love both as like You said, you can achieve very different vibes with using one or another.

February 21, 2024 at 7:55 am

Angie

(website)

Fashion Stylist

Glad this is resonating!

I think we all create high and low contrasts in our outfit. Contrast levels differ between the components of the outfit, and the outfits and our skin tone. It varies day to day too.

Back later. Busy day!

February 21, 2024 at 8:00 am

suntiger

I’ll wear more color contrast than value contrast- since I don’t have high contrast coloring. I decided I’m happiest with 2 dark and 1 medium color as an accent in my outfits- like black + navy + cognac. Or 3 dark colors-black + forest green + chocolate brown.

February 21, 2024 at 8:19 am

Ginger

Veteran

I like medium contrast. Is that a thing? High contrast is too stark to me. Sometimes I struggling with mixing a new outfit if the contrast level is off. If the value of two colors is too close, I don’t like it. One needs to be darker or heavier (though not necessarily DARK) and one needs to be lighter. Or one is white and the other is light/medium. Similar to suntiger, my outfits reflect the medium contrast in my own coloring.

I think it’s why I leaned heavily into blush pink for shoes, scarves, and jackets some years ago. It’s light but not white, so it would back off the contrast level from whatever else I was wearing.

February 21, 2024 at 8:39 am

Bonnie

Veteran

I have noticed that I tend to enjoy wearing medium contrast outfits more than high or low contrast. For example, I have a new dress and I discovered adding the high contrast shoes that I bought to wear with it put the focus on the shoes and looked too busy so I’ve ordered a more neutral pair to try. The high contrast shoes work well with my washed black jeans so all is good.

February 21, 2024 at 8:56 am

Style Fan

Veteran

I like medium contrast too. It feels the most natural to me.

February 21, 2024 at 9:41 am

Lee

Active Member

I feel pretty good in low, medium and high contrast. It definitely depends on the day.

February 21, 2024 at 9:53 am

Mirjana

Veteran

Great post, thank you.

February 21, 2024 at 10:13 am

nuancedream

Veteran

Contrast is one of those elements I never thought about when creating an outfit. I happily wore black/optic white and navy/optic white for years and wondered why I never looked that good in those colors. Medium or low contrast works best for me.

February 21, 2024 at 10:23 am

Suz

(website)

Veteran

My personal contrast levels are medium-to-low, so technically I believe I *should* be most flattered by similar contrast levels. Yet I have always felt better with a somewhat higher level of contrast in most (not all) outfits. Or at least I like to include some contrasting elements, e.g. navy and white stripe top. The exception seems to be white with light grey/ silver — I love this combination. I also like medium denim blues with white — similarly lower contrast. I also wear high contrast to my personal lighter colouring by wearing a lot of dark navy.

February 21, 2024 at 10:23 am

Firecracker (Sharan)

Veteran

I’ve found that high contrast doesn’t work as well for me as low-to-mid contrast. I hadn’t thought about drawing attention to certain elements with the contrast levels.

February 21, 2024 at 10:30 am

Carol

(website)

Veteran

I am a lover of color blocking, primary palettes, black and white patterns, and combos thereof. I love contrast as opposed to blending, and this post reminds me to be more conscious of it.

February 21, 2024 at 10:32 am

Eliza

Veteran

I like both low contrast tonal looks and medium contrast outfits. When my hair went from medium dark brown to white with some silver, I transformed to someone with a much lower contrast between my fair skin and hair. I had enjoyed working with the visual structure my high contrast coloring brought to a look. Now I often add hints of that with clothes and accessories and occasionally forgo it with white/ivory/silvery pale gray tones.

February 21, 2024 at 11:24 am

Vicki

(website)

Veteran

This topic is so timely, because I was just about to post something about an accessory, a beanie, and how to choose a color with hair color and if low contrast or high contrast is better. I will do so now. Thank you for mentioning this because it’s exactly what was going through my mind today.

February 21, 2024 at 11:26 am

K. Period.

Veteran

So helpful! I’ve been thinking about contrast a lot more than I ever have before. I realized recently how much more important adjusting my makeup contrast to my outfit contrast has become as the years pass and my natural contrast levels (hair, skin, flush, lip color) become softer. My makeup contrast has become part of my accessory capsule.

February 21, 2024 at 1:41 pm

Kyle

Veteran

Lately I’ve been much more attracted to low contrast outfits.

February 21, 2024 at 2:11 pm

Kate

Veteran

Low and medium contrast work best for me. High contrast only seems to work for me in high summer, when the light levels are different. Then I will happily wear high contrast looks.

February 21, 2024 at 2:14 pm

Laura

(website)

Veteran

I agree with Kyle. Much more into lower contrast lately. It’s fun to think about in creating outfits. Thanks Angie!

February 21, 2024 at 2:22 pm

Angie

(website)

Fashion Stylist

Fascinating!

Yes, you can think of high and low contrast on a continuum, with mid levels of contrast somewhere along that continuum.

As I said before, I think we create varying levels of contrast across outfits, across days, and across seasons. It depends soooo much on the items, and our mood.

February 21, 2024 at 2:42 pm

BlueJay

Veteran

I haven’t thought about items this way, or at least not consciously. I think I like both high and low contrast dressing. It’s very interesting to think of contrast for why an outfit may not work besides hem lengths, or proportions. Thanks Angie!

February 21, 2024 at 2:58 pm

The Cat

Veteran

For many of us, MEDIUM contrast might work best. It depends on your personal contrast.

Imogen Lamport at the Insideoutstyle blog has written several posts about high, low and medium contrast, e.g. this post about how to work with medium contrast: https://insideoutstyleblog.com/2014/12/how-to-work-with-your-contrast-medium-contrast.html

February 21, 2024 at 4:44 pm

MsMaven

Veteran

I’ve come to accept that I’m medium contrast, but that doesn’t mean I don’t occasionally do a high contrast combination. Timely post and comments, because I’m trying to weed out the colors that don’t work that well for me.

February 21, 2024 at 4:47 pm

Runcarla

Veteran

My personal colouring is low contrast and light. I do light coloured/low contrast in the summer, and dark in the other 3 seasons. I probably own more dark items (black and navy) than any other colour.

February 21, 2024 at 6:08 pm