I think brown gets a bad rap.

People love the various shades of brown: khaki, camel, rust and chestnut, cognac, mahogany…but as soon as you say BROWN you get EW.

But chocolate?? The warm lustre of old wood? A sleek seal brown horse? The perfect cup of dark coffee? Cascading brunette waves? A lovely brown-eyed boy?

None of those things are ew.

As always, it’s how you combine it with other colors. Remember, warm tones are happy with other warm tones. Cool tones play nicely with other cool colors. Not that you can’t combine warm and cool…but it’s a little harder to do well.

And repeat after me: Brown Goes with Black. Brown Goes with Black. Brown Goes with Black.

And blue. And green. And pink. And grey! I love brown for the fact that so many color combinations are a little unexpected.

Brown + Green


Any color combination found in nature is pretty much a sure win.

Brown + Pink

Maybe not as commonly found out in the world as brown and green, but still. A lot of browns have rosy undertones to them…look at Photos 1 and 4. And fuchsia is a nice contrast to the subdued vibes of brown.

Brown + Blue

This is another one of those silly “no-no’s” we’ve been living with for too many years. Brown looks great with denim…aqua/turquoise, clear sky blue…the list goes on.

Brown + Grey

I find brown and grey very chic.

Brown + Black

And of course, brown goes so well with the other autumn tones: golden yellow, orange, cream, red…but I wanted to share some of the more uncommon combinations.

Here are some ways I’ve worn brown…

I hope you’ll take another look at this undervalued color!

See you next time!