How to Find Your Colour Palette

...Only buy neutral colours for a while. This will make it easier to choose outfits, saving you time in the morning, and you will not have to buy extra items to go with the original item you wanted to buy, because the rest of your wardrobe will automatically pair well with it. (I should mention that, before you do this, you should declutter your wardrobe, removing any bright colours that you find hard to style.)

Only buying neutrals was my first step towards loving white dresses. I never would have reached for them before, but I quickly got bored of black dresses and found white midi styles to be perfectly elegant when it came to the warmer months.

Once you have a good capsule collection of neutrals, you can start experimenting again. One thing a lot of women worry about is how to know which colours suit them. There is plenty of advice on the internet from experts in this field, but my quickest way to do it is to find something in a colour you're drawn to and hold it up against your face. If it's a colour that suits your skintone and brings out your eyes, you will be able to tell immediately. If you're not sure, then do what I do and wear it anyway - it may not be your best colour but it clearly doesn't wash you out either!

The only colour I know suits me really, really well is dark green, because I did this test and was amazed at how much it brightened my skintone and brought out the colour of my eyes. I now think of green as my 'signature' colour, and when I want to venture away from neutrals, I look for statement green items like this gorgeous coat from Ted Baker (similar linked).

Let's talk about sunglasses. YOU DO NOT NEED A PAIR OF SUNGLASSES IN EVERY COLOUR. If you're aiming for a capsule wardrobe, you need 2 pairs. That's all. 1 in tortoiseshell, for lighter-coloured outfits, and 1 in black, for darker outfits. That. Is. All. No, you don't need the white retro pair that's on trend. You need black and brown. THAT'S ALL FOLKS.

(If you really love the white retro pair, you could probably forego the tortoiseshell pair and get these instead. They will do the same job but I feel tortoiseshell is more timeless.)

Above is an example of what NOT to do with colour - don't buy colourful accessories. (I still own this green bag, as it was a gift and it's too beautiful to declutter, but I got rid of the shoes as they just weren't that versatile.)

That's the problem with colourful accessories - they necessitate a neutral outfit. Obviously I have lots of neutral outfits, but I'd much rather have a colourful dress make a statement than my handbag or shoes - after all, if you're photographed, you will always be wearing your dress, but you might have put your handbag down or kicked your shoes off!

Even once you start experimenting with different colours, I would recommend always keeping accessories neutral. Black is an especially useful colour for accessories and it is also a good way of toning down really girly styles, such as a bow headband.