Suit colors
Every menswear guide names the same six suit colors and stops. The useful question is which version of each one suits you — because a navy cut for deep, cool coloring and a navy cut for soft, warm coloring are visibly different cloths, and wearing the wrong one is why a suit can fit perfectly and still look borrowed.
Frame Atelier reads three things from a photograph and reports them as your color profile: temperature (cool, neutral or warm), chroma (soft, balanced or clear) and depth (light, medium depth or deep). It measures contrast between your skin and hair as well, where the photograph supports it, and uses it to refine the reading. There is no personality label attached to it — the profile is the measurement, and the tables below are keyed to it.
Where one profile covers more than one stored palette, the cell shows every color the app can return at that profile rather than choosing between them. That applies to Cool · Clear · Medium depth and Warm · Clear · Medium depth — two readings close enough to share a profile at three bands per axis, and far enough apart to be worth showing as a range.
Navy is the first suit almost everyone buys and the one where the profile matters most, because the range runs from a soft grayed blue to near-black ink. Below is the navy Frame Atelier recommends for each profile — the same value the app returns after reading your photo.
| Color profile | Navy |
|---|---|
| Cool · Balanced · Light | Soft Navy #4A5870 |
| Cool · Soft · Medium depth | Soft Navy #3C4356 |
| Cool · Balanced · Medium depth | Slate Navy #3A4660 |
| Cool · Clear · Medium depth | Graphite Navy #262E40 Graphite Navy #242E44 |
| Cool · Clear · Deep | Blue-Black Navy #1E2536 |
| Neutral · Soft · Medium depth | Soft Navy #3A4458 |
| Warm · Balanced · Light | Light Navy #4A5A74 |
| Warm · Balanced · Medium depth | Inkwell Navy #2F3E48 |
| Warm · Clear · Medium depth | Warm Navy #34445E Bright Navy #2E415E |
| Warm · Balanced · Deep | Dark Navy #2A3444 |
Depth and chroma decide how close to ink the navy runs; temperature decides whether there is gray and slate in it or blue. Put the softest of these beside the deepest and the difference is obvious on the hanger — it is only invisible in a catalogue photograph.
The second suit. Charcoal is safer than navy across profiles because depth carries it, but the undertone still shifts: warm and neutral coloring gets a charcoal with brown or olive in the base, cool coloring gets one built on slate.
| Color profile | Charcoal |
|---|---|
| Cool · Balanced · Light | Soft Charcoal #4E525A |
| Cool · Soft · Medium depth | Slate Charcoal #3B3E44 |
| Cool · Balanced · Medium depth | Cool Charcoal #3A3E46 |
| Cool · Clear · Medium depth | Charcoal #33353A Charcoal #303338 |
| Cool · Clear · Deep | Charcoal #34363C |
| Neutral · Soft · Medium depth | Warm Charcoal #3E3A36 |
| Warm · Balanced · Light | Soft Charcoal #54504A |
| Warm · Balanced · Medium depth | Warm Charcoal #403A32 |
| Warm · Clear · Medium depth | Warm Charcoal #4A443C Warm Charcoal #3A3630 |
| Warm · Balanced · Deep | Warm Charcoal #38332C |
Gray is where a measured profile earns its keep, because “gray suit” describes three different garments. Light gray is a warm-weather suit, mid gray is the year-round business option, dark gray substitutes for charcoal with less severity.
| Color profile | Light | Medium | Dark |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cool · Balanced · Light | Light Gray #C6C8CA | Dove #AEB2B8 | Slate Gray #767C86 |
| Cool · Soft · Medium depth | Mist Gray #B9BDC1 | Dove Gray #9BA0A5 | Muted Slate #5C626A |
| Cool · Balanced · Medium depth | Cloud Gray #B4B8BC | Pewter #898E96 | Slate Gray #6E7680 |
| Cool · Clear · Medium depth | Ice Gray #C4C8CE Icy Gray #C8CACE | Cool Gray #9EA2A8 Cool Gray #A0A4AC | Slate #55595E Steel #6A7078 |
| Cool · Clear · Deep | Silver Gray #B6BABF | Pewter #84888E | Deep Gray #4E5258 |
| Neutral · Soft · Medium depth | Greige #A99F92 | Mushroom Gray #8A8176 | Olive Gray #6E6E60 |
| Warm · Balanced · Light | Warm Light Gray #BCB4A6 | Mushroom #A89A88 | Pebble Gray #7A7264 |
| Warm · Balanced · Medium depth | Warm Light Gray #A6A092 | Taupe #8A7A64 | Olive Charcoal #4E4C3C |
| Warm · Clear · Medium depth | Light Warm Gray #B6AFA2 Light Warm Gray #B4ACA4 | Warm Gray #9A9284 Warm Gray #98908A | Pebble Gray #6E675C Warm Graphite #5C5650 |
| Warm · Balanced · Deep | Warm Light Gray #9E978A | Taupe Gray #7A7268 | Olive Charcoal #3E4030 |
Brown is the suit color the profile separates most sharply. Warm coloring wears it better than any other, and some profiles have no brown that works at all. That is a real finding, not a hedge: where the table below is empty, the app recommends no brown suit for that profile.
| Color profile | Brown suits |
|---|---|
| Cool · Balanced · Light | Mocha #705E52 |
| Cool · Soft · Medium depth | Cocoa Taupe #6E5F56 |
| Cool · Balanced · Medium depth | Cocoa #5E5048 |
| Cool · Clear · Medium depth | no brown suit recommended |
| Cool · Clear · Deep | no brown suit recommended |
| Neutral · Soft · Medium depth | Tobacco #7A573A Camel #A17E5A Deep Taupe #6B5D50 |
| Warm · Balanced · Light | Light Camel #C8A878 Soft Tan #D2BC9A Cocoa #6E5640 |
| Warm · Balanced · Medium depth | Chocolate #5A4232 Tobacco #8A5A34 Camel #B08050 |
| Warm · Clear · Medium depth | Camel #B58452 Bronze #8A6A44 Golden Tan #C09A6A Chocolate #543E2C Camel #B27E4C Golden Tan #C49C68 |
| Warm · Balanced · Deep | Chocolate #4E3826 Espresso #3E2E24 Cognac #8A4E2E Deep Camel #9A6E42 |
Warm-weather suiting trades depth for lightness, which makes undertone more exposed, not less — a light suit sits right beside your face in bright daylight. Evening runs the other way: the darkest neutral your coloring carries cleanly.
| Color profile | Warm weather | Evening |
|---|---|---|
| Cool · Balanced · Light | Soft White #F2F0EA Greige #BBB2A4 Powder Blue #94AECC | Twilight Navy #37425A |
| Cool · Soft · Medium depth | Putty #C4BBAD Greige #A6A099 Dusty Blue #6F82A0 | Deep Slate #2F343C |
| Cool · Balanced · Medium depth | Soft White #EEEDE8 Cool Taupe #9A9288 French Blue #506E9E | Deep Navy #2C3448 |
| Cool · Clear · Medium depth | Crisp White #F4F4F2 Storm Taupe #8E8880 Royal Blue #2E4A94 Crisp White #F5F5F3 Icy Greige #C2C2BC Sapphire #2A4CA0 | Black #1A1A1C Black #191A1E |
| Cool · Clear · Deep | Crisp White #F3F3F0 Cool Taupe #948C82 Royal #2E4088 | Black #1B1B1E |
| Neutral · Soft · Medium depth | Oatmeal #D9CDBB Stone #B5AB9C Dusty Blue #7A8CA0 | Espresso #4A382C |
| Warm · Balanced · Light | Soft White #F6F0E2 Oatmeal #E3D8C2 Light Denim #8AA0BC | Deep Cocoa #5A452F |
| Warm · Balanced · Medium depth | Cream #F0E4CC Khaki Stone #B8A888 Warm Denim #566A80 | Espresso #453322 |
| Warm · Clear · Medium depth | Ivory #F5EBD8 Stone #C4B69E Medium Denim #5878A0 Ivory #F6EFDE Stone #C6B89E Bright Denim #4A72AC | Chocolate #5C4430 Warm Black-Brown #2C241E |
| Warm · Balanced · Deep | Cream #EDE0C8 Stone #AFA28E Deep Denim #45586E | Black-Brown #2E2620 |
Black appears for evening on 2 of the ten profiles — Cool · Clear · Medium depth and Cool · Clear · Deep — and on no other. Everywhere else a very deep espresso, deep slate or your own darkest neutral reads as formal without the harshness black creates.
All of the above assumes you know your profile. If you do not, the analysis takes about a minute: photograph yourself in indirect daylight with a white sheet of paper under your chin, and Frame Atelier reads your temperature, chroma, depth and contrast from the photo on your own device. It returns your profile, then the exact suit colors above — plus shirts, ties and leathers built to go with them.
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