"Golden" undertones?! Confused

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Emily V.

Apr 3, 2016

Emily V.

This question may be kind of silly, but when it comes to makeup, is a "golden" undertone a yellow one or?? There's Golden, Neutral, and Rosy... Can someone better explain this to me?? Thank you!

Alexis C.

Apr 3, 2016

Alexis C.

Golden = yellow
Rosy = pink
Neutral = even between yellow and pink

Emily V.

Apr 3, 2016

Emily V.

Okay thank you girls!! I just wasn't really sure haha!!

Sabrina K.

Apr 4, 2016

Sabrina K.

Jacqueline you have a way of explaining everything so it's so easy to understand! We are so lucky to have you as part of this community! Hopefully Emily got her question answerd!

Aurora S.

Apr 4, 2016

Aurora S.

I think it depends on the brand.
Usually golden means yellow but how the company defines "golden" is up to them, really.
Sometimes golden can refer to yellow toned skin with a little bit of pink AKA warm yellow making a sort of peach (for lighter skin) or honey (for darker skins which can look orange due to the added pink/red)

Or sometimes the lighter shades will be yellow and the medium to darker shades will have that honey color (which is why some people with medium/ darker skins find they end up orange with certain brands cause some aren't consistent from light-dark. A few East Asians and mixed women, like Alicia keys, have this type of honey undertone. A normal yellow undertone makes them look washed out due to the lack of pink/red)


I don't think olive skin would be in the picture since most brands don't really cater to this tone (cool toned yellow) if they do, the usually have a description that states "yellow with olive tones" or "golden with olive tones"
"Olive" isn't really a specific skin color it's more of a sort of skin undertone which is green hence "olive"
You could be quite fair (Lucy hale) or quite deep in color and have an olive tone.
I see it a lot in Mediterranean and south Asian women.
I know other brands have shades that are neutral olive (beige with green tones) and then others with golden olive (yellow with green tones)

Kind of like how some brands define neutral differently.
It's the "not pink but not yellow"
So some define it as pink AND yellow resulting in a sort of peach color whereas others define it as a beige undertone

I think if you can, definitely look at swatches, get samples etc

Aurora S.

Apr 4, 2016

Aurora S.

Here's my personal guide with people who are more medium/tan skin toned since you can see the undertones more and I tend to work with this skin tone more (some photos have had added saturation due to explaining undertones which are normally a bit more subtle)

1. On medium to dark skins "neutral" is just brown. It's not pink, not golden and not peach either. Just a neutral brown. (On lighter skin it's just beige)

2. Neutral/Olive= this will have the beige-brown color with a green tint

3. Yellow-Golden= a true yellow. Lighter skins have a lighter undertone (yellow) darker skins have that same undertone just darker (golden)

4. Yellow-Golden Olive= compared to #2 you can see this range has yellow tones but compared to number #3 you can tell there are green tones. This cool toned yellow undertone has enough yellow to be confused into buying a true yellow undertone resulting in the neck/rest of the body looking washed out/looking like it has a pale yellow undertone. In normal fluorescent lights this undertone tends to look darker and commonly mismatched with foundation due to that.

5. Peach-Honey= similar to #3 but does have some pink/red tones. This range is actually more common. Tends to look washed out with a true yellow undertone and looks yellow when wearing a pink undertone foundation. (Lighter skins=peach and medium-darker skins=honey) on lighter skin it doesn't look so orange.

6. Pink-Red= a "rosy" skintone that has obvious pink tones. Usually the lighter someone is the lighter the undertone (pink) and the darker they are the darker the undertone (red) but that isn't always the case, I've seen medium skin with pink undertones and not at red.

#3 is what would be considered "golden" but some brands also put #5 as "golden" either just #5 or in conjunction with #3. (Lighter shades #3 darker shades #5)

Emma B.

Apr 7, 2016

Emma B.

Lots of times people say
People with warm tones look good in gold so mabey that is why you hered that

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