Pantone 'Colour Of The Year 2021': Celebrate grey and yellow in your makeup

Grey and yellow will only go well with its colour families so pair them carefully to achieve a classy look. Photo: 123rf.com

With work from home becoming the norm in our pandemic world, many may have abandoned the joy of playing with colours through makeup, manicures or hair colour.

In a dull and depressing time, there’s nothing like colour to lift our spirits and brighten our lives. And now, there is an excuse to start thinking and playing with colour as the global colour authority, the Pantone Color Institute, has just announced its highly anticipated colour forecast for the new year.

The Pantone Color Institute has annointed Pantone Ultimate Grey and Illuminating (yellow) to express the mood for the "Colour Of The Year 2021".

On the choice of these two colours, Leatrice Eiseman, executive director of The Pantone Color Institute, explains on Pantone’s website, “The union of an enduring Ultimate Grey with the vibrant yellow illuminating expresses a message of positivity supported by fortitude.

"Practical and rock solid but at the same time warming and optimistic, this is a colour combination that gives us resilience and hope. We need to feel encouraged and uplifted; this is essential to the human spirit.”

Read more: Strutting into 2021, what can you expect from fashion trends?

Steven Sunny, one of the top makeup artists in Malaysia, says, “I love them in a combination or used independently. With these contrasting shades, different elements come together to support one another, and at the same time, it gives off a sunny and classy, yet friendly vibe.”

“Yellow is a bright and cheerful colour while grey offers feelings of composure, steadiness and resilience - qualities that can inspire and encourage us in this time of uncertainty,” he says.

When wearing a bright colour like yellow, the advice is to choose one feature to focus on. Photo: Steven Sunny

With two decades of experience as a professional makeup artist, Steven Sunny is highly sought-after by global beauty brands as a makeup artist, hairstylist and stylist.

Without brand launch events since the pandemic hit early last year, he has been busy being fully booked to host live demos virtually on makeup, skincare and hair topics. He is also planning on starting his own YouTube channel, Steven Sunny TV, where he will be talking about beauty and lifestyle matters.

Steven Sunny says grey and yellow can easily be applied for beauty from makeup, nail colour to hair colour, but with the right placement and pairing.

“For makeup, one can apply a bright yellow eyeshadow with a soft smokey application and just an eyeliner complemented with a voluminous mascara for luscious lashes in yellow or jet black.

“Or apply a grey eyeshadow on the upper eyelid, jet black mascara combined with a bright yellow eyeliner on the waterline, and smoke it out with yellow eyeshadow on the lower lash line. Then make your eyes pop with a bright yellow mascara for just the lower lash."

Steven Sunny says there are two ways to wear these colours as a lip colour, as a base colour or on its own, and he explains, “When yellow is used as a base colour on your lips (before applying your chosen lip colour) it warms up your lip colour, while grey as a base colour will give your lips a cool tone.

"The second way to wear them as a lip colour in a modern way is to play with a yellow on the top lip and a grey on the bottom lip.”

He says makeup should be fun and creative, and to top it off one can add some coloured or transparent glitter makeup to jazz up the look.

For nails and hair, he says there are many ways to wear these two colours and they can be applied independently or in a combination.

“When choosing your manicure colour, here’s an easy but very chic manicure look, where one can opt for grey colour on three nails and bright yellow on the rest.”

Read more: Mastering office makeup in the age of face masks and Zoom

To honour these two colours on your hair, he says one can choose to have the upper portion of your hair in bright yellow while the ends are soften with an ash grey tone for a modern mix.

“Ash grey hair gives off a cool edginess and celebrates your individuality. You can choose to have ash grey for the whole head and apply a bright yellow on the inner parts of your hair for a modern and fun look.”

When wearing these two colours, Steven Sunny says that anyone, whether one has fairer or darker skin tone, can wear it, but he cautions that these colours can “nudeup” or lighten up on fairer skin and darken on darker skin tones.

“When we talk about colours, individually there are so many different shades and textures of the family colour. One can mix the colours up to get an ombre toning so that it won’t look flat.”

On the do's and don’ts when it comes to wearing a bright colour like yellow, he advises, “Just choose one feature to focus on. For example, if you choose to wear it on your nails and hair, then your makeup should just be nude or natural.”

“Remember that these colours only go well with its colour families when you are pairing them, as other colours that are out of the colour family will not be complimentary. The whole point is you want to achieve a classy look,” Steven Sunny advises.