What color do you love but find hard to wear on your lips?
I really like orange lipsticks (like true orange) but don’t love how they often look on me… though I wear them anyway, haha.
— Christine
Explore Temptalia
We're here to help you make better beauty purchases that you'll enjoy and love! We recommend signing up to take advantage of personalized features like tracking products you own, viewing dupes that you already have, and more!
Here are some useful resources for you:
Compare Any Two
Curious how two shades compare to each other? Type in the shades below to get instant side-by-side swatches!
26 Comments
Comments that do not adhere to our comment policy may be removed. Discussion and debate are highly encouraged but we expect community members to participate respectfully. Please keep discussion on-topic, and if you have general feedback, a product review request, an off-topic question, or need technical support, please contact us!
Please help us streamline the comments' section and be more efficient: double-check the post above for more basic information like pricing, availability, and so on to make sure your question wasn't answered already. Comments alerting us to typos or small errors in the post are appreciated (!) but will typically be removed after errors are fixed (unless a response is needed).
We appreciate enthusiasm for new releases but ask readers to please hold questions regarding if/when a review will be posted as we can't commit to or guarantee product reviews. We don't want to set expectations and then disappoint readers as even products that are swatched don't always end up being reviewed due to time constraints and changes in priorities! Thank you for understanding!
Comments on this post are closed.
We try to approve comments within 24 hours (and reply to them within 72 hours) but can sometimes get behind and appreciate your patience! 🙂 If you have general feedback, product review requests, off-topic questions, or need technical support, please contact us directly. Thank you for your patience!
Definitely purple, I have a light skin tone and it makes me look kind of sick. I try it on often, but then I never go out wearing it unless it’s Halloween
Orange as well, and blues, greens, teals… I love statement lips but those colours make me look so ruddy unless my base isn’t full-coverage, and my teeth look yellow! Although I did decide that I will wear lilac and lavender so maybe it’s just a matter of making it work ??
Red lips or deep vamp colors. Too bold for my small mouth
This question is easy because I have quite a bit of lipstick-envy when it comes to certain shades:
“Greige” shades make me look like a corpse, which is disappointing because I really like them.. Blue tends to look ugly on me, except Colourpop Getty, which works for some odd reason…maybe because it’s got some green in it? Most corals look icky on me, with two exceptions: MAC Crosswires and See Sheer. White-based shades and super light shades, like MAC Blankety, are unflattering on me. And dark burgundy shades make my naturally full lips look thin, and make my smile lines look more prominent.
But, thankfully, there are tons of shades that do work on me, ergo my three-digit lipstick collection!
It’s not so much I can’t wear it, but I can’t pick it. Anything but beige, if I choose it without help, I look ill. I know the rules and I think I understand my skin tone, but I always pretend to be clueless and go ask for help because I’m incapable of choosing something flattering on my own. It’s incredibly frustrating. (I know we’re allowed to chuck the rules out, but I like looking like I’m outside for reasons other than a doctor’s appointment)
Dark reds, browns, purples – they age me.
Very light peachy nudes, greyish nudes – I look dead; there is no contrast with my face.
Taupes, certain dusted pink mauve, mauve – they don’t good look with my skin undertone and are not flattering.
Bright orange, certain red-orange, gold – not flattering on my fair skin.
On another note, for my fellow Canadians: the three new E/S palettes from Pat McGrath are available on Sephora Canada as I write.
Don’t let Samantha hear you say that about orange lips, lol! I also really love the *idea* of superbright, orange-red (e.g. ColourPop Rêver, Dose of Colors Hot Fire), but oranges tend to bring out the yellow-green in my skin AND the yellow in my teeth. ?
I love that “unusual” colors like blue and green are becoming more commonplace, but whenever I try to wear them they just don’t feel like -me-.
Ditto, I found one lavender color that YSL just came out with for Automne 2018 (and Sephora France never received it, argh!)
Greige and many nudes. I’m medium warm and tend to look best in corals, fuchsias, and magentas.
Tammy, same! I LOVE greige on others, but it looks HORRID on me. ?
Me too! Cannot wear many nudes or greige shades either. The only Nude I have is CT Bitch Perfect. It looks good, but need a lipgloss over it to make it pop. I look best in corals, fushias & orange-reds.
Very cool toned fuchsia and pink shades look utterly hideous on me, yet I can wear some warm purples or fuchsias! Pale shades like MAC Snob and St. Germain give me powder donut mouth, so shades like those are a no-go, too. As is anything with a strong yellow base, as I’m an ex-smoker and I still drink coffee and tea. Oh well, I can live without those, anywho!
But; the one that makes me really sad that it looks ugly on me? Strongly, resolutely greige lipstick!
My lips are the one place where I wear whatever I like without caring about the final effect, so in essence, I don’t find any colors that I like hard to wear on my lips.
90’s style browns…love the look on other people, but it doesn’t really match the rest of makeup style.
Also greiges and light mauves. They look so pretty, but they look too light on me (medium-tan) and give me that zombie-look.
Yeah, those too. The more I read I’m wondering what colors DO work for me, ha!
Pinks and fuschias…I love them until they are on my lips.
BTW, I think you look great in orange lipstick Christine, along with every other color. I envy your ability to wear corals too.
Orange lipsticks are really tricky. The enamel on my teeth is transparent, so the yellow dentin at the center of my teeth is visible. Red-oranges or super-bright oranges seem to work well. True oranges are trickier. Some lighter, yellow-based oranges make the teeth yellowing worse, while others seem to make them look whiter! It’s a crap shoot, and frustrating.
Navy can have similar issues. Most have no effect, but some make my teeth look whiter. Others can make them look more yellow or even slightly green.
I have quite a list that don’t work on me but I will try and restrain myself from listing them all. Suffice to say, anything that is too pale as I have pigmented lips and even if I try to wipe the colour out with foundation, it just looks horrible. Not something I think looks flattering on someone, even if it didn’t wear off horribly. I can’t wear anything with too much orange in it. I never have been able to but would say it has gotten worse as I have aged as the orange shades bring out the yellow tones in my teeth. I can’t wear anything too deeply purple as it makes my under eye circles look more pronounced. Anything that is going to brown or greige I can’t pull off either. So, I live in the world of pink, plum, fuschia, red, mauve (as long as it doesn’t have too much of a grey cast).
I don’t wear statement lips in the more unusual colours as they would be high maintenance and I just don’t have the time or patience for that. Also, in the little town that I live in people would laugh if I went out with teal, black or blue lipstick. It isn’t that I care what anybody thinks or even that it might not look good but I think I am just too conventional (insert old) to wear them, LOL.
I love red lipstick, but I do have to be careful that it doesn’t turn pink on my lips – which I loathe.
I do like mattes and warm coral to oranges but my lips get too dry for mattes and the colors clash terribly.
Easy. Red. Don’t need this much attention to my lips. Whether I want it or not is a totally different story 🙂
Really light nudes that normally look fab on no one ever. And the peachy nudes. And green. And some blues. How can you tell a warm undertone blue from a cool undertone blue, by the way?
Ditto, orange or yellows, and I don’t wear them. I probably need to be bold like you Christine and just go for it!
Corals & I don’t mix well. Too bad because there are so many gorgeous corals out there!
I like nudes but nudes don’t seem to like me being pale just doesn’t add to anything making me look healthier/lively but I’ll wear them sometimes. Why not?! The only thing I dontcwsar are black, greens, blue.