Cream Test: Grab two articles of clothing, one white and the other off-white. While wearing no makeup, decide which color complements your skin tone best. If it's the pure-white shade, your undertones are warm. If the cream color suits you more, you have cool undertones.
Finding your undertone: The colour of your veins
Take a look at the veins on the inside of your wrist. Do they appear more blue or green? If your veins appear more blue, you're cool-toned but if you see more green, you're warm-toned. If you see a fair amount of both both green and blue, you have a neutral undertone.
Look at the colour of the veins in your wrist. As a general rule of thumb if they are blue then you are pink toned. If they are green then you are yellow toned. If you burn easily your skin tone is probably Pink.
Grab a pure white piece of clothing or even just a piece of white paper. In bright, natural light, hold the item up to your face. If your skin looks pink or rosy by comparison, you're cool toned. If your face looks more yellow, your undertone is warm.
In a place with bright, natural light, hold up a piece of printer paper and look at how your skin reacts to it. If your skin looks pinkish against the paper, you probably have cooler undertones; if your skin looks yellow against the paper, you're probably a warm tone.
If you've picked the wrong undertone:
If you are COOL and pick a WARM or NEUTRAL foundation, it will look yellow on you. If you are WARM and pick a COOL foundation, it will make your skin look pale and icy. If you pick a NEUTRAL foundation, it will look grey.
A pink undertone is a term for a light reddish-pink tone that is generally found in fair-skinned people. If you have a pink undertone, it's likely you're more prone to rosacea and sensitive to sunburns, but those with this undertone look great in makeup and red clothing.
Green Concealer
Green is opposite the color wheel from red, so it's perfect for hiding any redness on your face, like pimples and acne scars. If you have rosacea, a color correcting green primer will help hide unwanted redness and give you an even base for applying foundation.
The Jewelry Test
Hold both golden and silver jewelry against your skin (or lay them on your wrist). If the gold jewelry makes you look good, you have warm or olive undertones. If rose gold, platinum, or silver jewelry look more flattering on you, you have cooler undertones.
Take a good look at the veins on your wrist under natural light for an easy way to determine your undertone. If your veins look green, it is likely you have warm undertones; if they are blue/purple, you have cool undertones. If they appear blue/green or match your skin colour, you most likely have neutral undertones.
The experts have spoken, and the answer is, foundation should be one or two shades lighter than your skin tone. This is because when you use bronzer or contour then the foundation should be able to blend and give the perfect look to your face.
Celebrity makeup artist Frederick Sanders recommends starting with two or three shades that look closest to your complexion and blending them all in fully. "The foundation should match the side of your face and your neck to prevent you from looking like you're wearing a mask," he says.
Skin with pink or rosy undertones works well with the beige tones of medium champagne hair. The green and blue tints in the champagne color will counteract the pink undertones of the skin.
Apply Foundation to Minimise Face and Neck Colour Differences. Once you've got that new foundation at home, don't apply it just to the face. Blend your makeup, preferably with a blending sponge, all the way down, over and beneath the jawbone, to the neck. This creates a seamless look.
Nailing the perfect foundation shade can be tricky, but it all comes down to determining your undertone. The goal of a foundation is to match your natural skin tone and even out the overall appearance of your skin. Using the correct foundation shade will allow your natural skin tone to shine through.
“Those with warm-undertone skin tend to favor hues of orange, yellow, green, off-white, and warm red, while those with cool-undertone skin will look best in shades of purple, fuchsia, pink, white, and blue,” says Newman.
Warm undertone means your skin has hints of yellow or orange. If you are a warm undertone, your veins should appear green-olive. People with warm undertones also tend to look better in gold jewelry.
A foundation with too much warmth for your skin can cause your face makeup to appear orange. You may be using a foundation with a warm undertone when you actually have a cool or neutral undertone to your skin.
I wanted to test skin color separately to find out whether it's important to perceptions of beauty. I found that without regard to physical features, people prefer light brown skin over dark brown skin or pale skin,” said Frisby, associate professor of strategic communication at the School.
Warm undertones look better in gold jewelry, whereas, cool undertones look great in silver jewelry. Generally, warmer skin tones look flattering in warmer colors (like red, orange and yellow) and cool skin tones look flattering in cooler colors (like blue, green, purple).
Here is a chart I've created representing the 6 basic skin types; pale, fair, medium, olive, naturally brown, and very dark brown/black.