Makeup Ideas to Go With a Royal Blue Prom Dress
Blue has always been a popular color in fashion. In its many different shades, it can evoke nature, innocence, or even power. Royal blue is a showstopping power color for people who don’t want to go with the somewhat overused red and black options for power dressing. Royal blue is also a great color for a prom dress, whether you’re a prom queen or not.
Prom is about going all out and having a look that you love so it’s important to make sure your whole outfit is coherent. Your makeup is also part of that fragile ecosystem so it’s important to consider how it works with the color of your dress.
Royal blue is an extremely saturated, vivid shade of blue. It’s not as deep and subtle as navy, and it tends to have cool, violet undertones. Thanks to that cool tone, it’s often recommended for individuals with a cooler skin tone. Royal blue is especially striking on people with cool-toned dark skin, but people of many shades can pull it off.
It’s important to make sure your makeup is also cool toned to match the undertone of your dress. Going with a warm-based color palette can make you look strange or even a little under the weather when you’re wearing such a strong cool color.
When you’re trying to coordinate your makeup with a royal blue dress you have two options you can choose from: high contrast and low contrast.
High Contrast Makeup
Royal blue is already a strong color, but if you want to go for a big and bold look, you may want to choose bright makeup colors that contrast with your blue dress and draw more attention to your features.
In this case, a bold red lip is a great choice to enhance your smile. Choose a cool toned, or blue-leaning red to create more harmony within your outfit.
Black and gold are strong shades that you can use in your eye makeup if you’d rather have a look focused on your eyes. Gold is a great contrasting shade for royal blue, so gold eyeshadow with black liner will give a smoldering effect. Go with a shimmering shade to really stand out.
Low Contrast Makeup
You might prefer to do a softer makeup look, allowing the royal blue to be the star of the show. In this case, you’ll want to choose more natural shades, but ones that still have a cool undertone. Instead of going with a bright coral-leaning pink, choose a soft violet pink or mauve to reflect the undertone of your dress.
Instead of a strong black eyeliner, a dark brown or smoky grey can soften the look and give a more subtle appearance. You could even add some blue eye shadow in a slightly sheer shade that matches your dress. This is especially flattering for people with dark brown eyes. Tan and brown eye shadow are also good options, especially for people with blue and green eyes.
Can I Pull Off Royal Blue?
All this discussion of color tones may make you wonder if royal blue will look good on you. While there are plenty of online resources for figuring out your color season and other ways to categorize your natural features, there are simpler ways such as checking the color of your veins through your skin.
The best way to decide if a color will suit you, though, is to just go to a store and try on some different colors to see which ones you feel best in. If a color makes you look sick, it’s probably not the right undertone for you, but if it makes you look more lively, it’s a good match.
If you love the idea of a royal blue dress, but aren’t sure if that shade is right for you, there are so many other beautiful shades of blue to explore. We love that Sherri Hill’s collection lets you search by color so you can see the full range of blue prom dresses available from this brand.
Makeup Ideas to Go With a Royal Blue Prom Dress: Put Your Best Face Forward
Prom season is full of decisions, but once you’ve chosen the color of your dress, that can help you choose everything else. Your makeup should harmonize with your dress, but you can still be as bold or as subtle as you like. There’s no need to overthink it, instead focus on having a great night with your closest friends!