Best Lip Colours for Olive and Tanned Skin

If a pale nude has ever made you look tired, ill or slightly grey, it is not you. It is your undertone, and olive skin eats pale nudes alive.

This episode is about the shades that do the opposite. Berry, terracotta, brick: the lip colours that make olive and tanned skin look lit from inside.

Why the best lip colours for olive skin are never the safe ones

Olive skin, which covers a huge range of Egyptian and Gulf complexions from fair Alexandrian to sun-deep Aswan, has a green-gold undertone sitting under the surface. It is what makes the skin look so good in gold jewellery and so flat in silver.

That same undertone is why a beige or milky pink lip, the "safe" shade in every global campaign, can look chalky on us. Those nudes are mixed for pink or neutral undertones. On olive skin the green in the skin and the grey in the nude meet in the middle and cancel each other out.

The answer is warmth and depth. Shades with red, brown or orange in them bring out the gold and quieten the green.

Berry: the everyday lip colour for olive skin

If you only own one lip colour, make it a berry. Not a cold, purple-blue berry, but one with a warm red heart, the colour of a mulberry or a ripe fig.

Berry works because it sits close to the natural colour of olive lips, just deeper. It looks like you, on a good day. It also holds up to a bold eye and to everyday clothes equally well.

On fair olive skin, a sheer berry such as the Blueberry Tart shade of our Lip Glaze gives a soft tint with a glass-like shine that reads as effortless. On deeper tanned skin the same shade layered twice turns into a proper evening lip.

Terracotta: the colour Egypt has always worn

Terracotta, that burnt orange-brown of a clay pot in the sun, is a very old idea here. Egyptologists believe the earliest lip colour in Egypt, around five thousand years ago, was red ochre, an iron-rich clay that dries to exactly this warm, earthy shade. Our ancestors chose it partly because it was what the desert offered and partly, we suspect, because it looked right on their skin.

It still does. Terracotta pulls the golden warmth to the surface of tanned skin, especially after a summer on the North Coast. It is also the shade that makes an olive complexion look healthy in fluorescent office light, which is not a small thing.

Wear it slightly blurred rather than sharp. A terracotta stain pressed in with a finger, no hard edge, looks modern and lasts through lunch.

Brick: the red that olive skin can actually wear

Every woman is told she should own a red. The problem is that most reds are blue-based, and blue-based reds can make olive skin look sallow around the mouth.

Brick red, with brown and orange in it, solves that. It has the drama of a red without the argument with your undertone. It is the shade for an Eid gathering, a wedding or any evening where you want the lip to be the point.

For brick, definition matters. Use the Lip Contour Stain to shape the edge first, blend it inwards, then fill. A red with a clean outline looks deliberate; a red that has wandered looks like it happened to you.

Shades to be careful with, and how to make them work

Pale nude, cool mauve and frosted pink are the usual offenders. You do not have to give them up, you just have to anchor them. A warm brown contour around the edge, with the pale shade only in the centre, stops the whole lip from going flat.

Deep plum and true black-cherry are gorgeous on olive skin, but they need the skin around the mouth to be even. A touch of concealer at the corners does the job.

And if you are between fair and tanned, which most of us are between winter and August, keep one berry and one terracotta and swap as the season moves.

Finding your shade without guessing

The quickest test: hold a gold ring and a silver ring against your inner wrist in daylight. If the gold looks better, you are warm-olive and the shades above are your friends. If it is a genuine tie, you are neutral and can go slightly cooler on the berry.

And if you order and the shade is not right for you, we swap it for another shade, free, always. Everything ships in two to three days across Egypt, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Jordan, so trying a colour is not a big commitment.

FAQ: lip colours for olive skin

What lipstick colour looks best on olive skin?

Warm shades with red, brown or orange in them: berry, terracotta and brick red are the reliable trio. They bring out the golden undertone in olive skin rather than fighting it, and they work across fair to deeply tanned complexions.

Can olive skin wear nude lipstick?

Yes, but choose a nude with warmth, closer to caramel or rosy brown than beige or pale pink. Pairing a pale nude with a warm brown contour around the edge also stops it looking flat or grey.

What red lipstick suits tanned skin?

A brick or tomato red with orange and brown undertones. Blue-based reds can make tanned and olive skin look sallow, while warm reds make it glow. Define the edge with a contour first so the colour stays crisp.