It’s rare to see one of Pantone’s Colors of the Year be so widely embraced, but Viva Magenta, their color of the year for 2023 seems to be the great unifier. It stands to reason considering anyone can claim it as their own no matter what their personal coloring looks like. Magenta is like Switzerland, it takes no sides. For people with cool coloring, the blue undertones in the shade make it a clear winner, yet, at the same time, it’s easy for those with warm coloring to be drawn in by the equally visible warm undertones.
It’s easy to be wooed in by magenta’s charisma. It’s a bright, bold, and vivacious color that is rich with great depth. I read a comment about magenta that summed it up perfectly: magenta brings warmth to cool colors and pops warm shades. It’s also a color that plays well as a color to wear and also use as an accent. Therefore, whether you are all in or just looking to add touches of it to your wardrobe, magenta is a color that everyone can wear.
EMBRACING VIVA MAGENTA IN YOUR WARDROBE: HOW TO ADD MAGENTA TO YOUR LOOKS
Last week, I did a deep dive into Magenta and scoured retailers for this shade for you to shop, and this week, as promised, I am giving you some tips on how you can incorporate the color into your looks. No matter what your coloring is or how boldly you want to go with this hue, you will find some guidance in what I am featuring.
Outfit #1
Magenta up against colors like teal or deep evergreen shades are beautiful combinations that manage to be colorful without being obnoxious. I commonly wear magenta and teal together and I’m someone who rarely wears a lot of color in my outfits. If you consider that teal is a universally flattering shade given its balance of warm and cool colors, it makes sense that magenta, also a shade that balances warm and cool, plays so beautifully together. Teal is considered a universal color because of its warm/cool balance.
I styled this magenta cotton fisherman sweater from Quince with a teal blue-green striped relaxed oxford from Everlane, a way that I often wear my own Quince cotton fisherman in navy. The sweater is roomy enough to pair with a button-down underneath in a relaxed way. I pop my collar, let the cuffs of my shirt roll into the cuffs of the sweater, and let my shirt tails hang out. Usually, I wear this look with jeans, like this pair from Paige. The loafers from Margaux, a client favorite, aren’t exactly teal but the evergreen green shade also has that warm/cool balance being a very blue-green. Lastly, I popped some magenta drop earrings with the outfit.
Outfit #2
If you are looking for a coat in a pop color, magenta is a safe choice because it’s rare that it won’t work with whatever you are wearing. I see the appeal of buying a neutral coat instead of a colorful one; colorful coats can have incredible limitations if they don’t work well with the all shades in your closet. However, given magenta’s flexibility, if you are looking for a bold color to keep you warm this year, magenta would most certainly be one to consider.
In this look, I kept the rest of the outfit I styled with a magenta coat from Noize understated. I created a navy column with this pair of Foster pants from M.M. Lafleur, a pair of navy M.Gemi block-heeled boots, a navy collared sweater from Reiss, and the navy Vancouver bag from Demellier. With the coat, I added a magenta and red plaid scarf. It’s not easy pairing magenta and red so it’s probably best to let someone else do it for you, like choosing a print that marries the colors. However, if you are feeling confident to try it yourself, the trick is to look for reds with undertones that capture the strongest undertone in your magenta shade. You may not know this but red is the only primary color that can be either warm or cool.
Outfit #3
The last two looks skewed cooler than warmer, but in this look, I am popping magenta with olive. This unlikely duo works so well because the warmth of the olive pulls out the warmth of the magenta. This goes back to that comment about how magenta pops warm colors. These magenta pumps contrast while complementing the olive and at the same time heightens the color vs. dragging it down.
I styled this olive dress from M.M. Lafleur with a pair of magenta pumps from Marc Fisher, added an ivory Veronica Beard blazer, and finished the look with geometric hoop earrings from Quince.
Outfit #4
Styling magenta in your wardrobe isn’t just about giving the shade a subtle platform for the color to shine. Like in the first look, magenta is also a great team player, and here, I paired magenta with a bright orange, which seems crazy to consider. However, the shade of orange and the shade of magenta (which, in this case, definitely skews pinker), share a lot of commonalities. They share similar chroma (clarity), and similar value (how light or dark a color is). In addition, the warmth of the orange and the warmth of the magenta match. If all that just read like Greek to you, you can read more about all this in my post about color theory.
This is an outfit for the bold, especially when in addition to the magenta and orange, I added this button-down shirt with contrasting cuffs and collar from Robert Graham, but it all works together to create this eye-catching look that I styled with magenta wide-leg trousers from Banana Republic and the orange belt from Rebecca Minkoff. With all this energy, I kept the rest of the outfit simple and used sand pumps and a basic link necklace from Julie Vos.
Outfit #5
Camel, black, cognac, and magenta may seem like an unlikely combination, but not when you see them used together in the look above it’s perfect. Camel and magenta can be a beautiful combination. I used Magenta sparingly in this case for those of you who see adding it in a small way and incorporated this bag by Valentino by Mario Valentino. The bag adds a pop to this camel coat from Avec Les Filles, a slim pair of black pants, and a turtleneck from M.M. Lafleur, which I layered under a 3/4 zip from BA&SH. I finished the look with these cognac boots from AGL.
Shop for Magenta
If you’re still looking for more magenta to add to your wardrobe, be sure to check out last week’s post with all my picks.
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