Pink shirts are versatile and can be worn in a variety of settings ranging from casual to formal. But what color pants should you wear with a pink shirt?
A pink shirt can be worn with pants in neutral colors such as white, grey, cream, or black in dressier settings. For a more eye-catching combination, wear a pink shirt with maroon, blue, or green pants instead.
First, we’ll go through some essential points to bear in mind whenever you’re deciding what pants color to wear with your pink shorts.
After this, we’ll run through some great combos you could try out yourself, as well as when one of them might be more appropriate than the others.
Let’s get to it.
Color Matching Pink Shirts With Pants: Guidelines
While one or two of these “rules” or “guidelines” might be more important to you, it’s worth considering all of them when putting your pink shirt combo together.
1. Consider The Dress Code
Here are the main dress codes you’re likely to come across:
- Casual – Think T-shirts, jeans, and sweatpants. A pink dress shirt is inappropriate.
- Smart-casual – A pink shirt may be appropriate, but consider a more casual shirt style (eg. Oxford Cloth Button Down).
- Business-Casual – Think dress shirts, chinos, and sweaters. Avoid ties and two-piece suits. A pink shirt is likely to be ideal.
- Formal – A pink dress shirt may be appropriate, but should be worn with a 2-piece suit.
The dress code may influence the color of the pants you choose to wear with your pink shirt.
As you’ll see in the combination examples down below, monochromatic color schemes and neutral-colored pants (eg. navy blue, grey, black) are more formal-looking.
Consider them in business-casual or formal settings.
If the setting is more smart-casual, you’ve got more options and could go for a higher-contrast pink shirt and pants combo instead. Eg. a pink shirt with sky blue or sage green pants.
2. Consider The Shade Of Pink
The shade of the pink shirt you’re wearing may help you decide what pants color would work best with it.
To cut a long story short, dark pink shirts often work better with light-colored pants while light pink shirts look great with dark-colored pants.
This isn’t exactly a hard-and-fast rule.
After all, a light pink shirt paired with light grey pants often works great.
However, going for some light vs dark contrast between the shade of the pink shirt and the shade of the pants is a good way to go.
It adds balance to the combination.
3. Consider The Color Wheel
The color wheel shows how colors relate to each other.
It can be split into “warm” colors and “cool” colors – the two halves of the wheel.
Warm colors are reds, oranges, and yellows.
A pink shirt would fall firmly within the “warm” half of the wheel.
Cool colors are blues, greens, and purples.
Why is this important?
Understanding the color wheel, even to a very basic extent, comes in very useful when color-matching clothes.
You can combine the pink shirt with pants in other warm colors for a low-contrast but vibrant and eye-catching combination.
Alternatively, you could combine the pink shirt with pants in cool colors (eg. greens and blues) for a high-contrast combination instead.
We’ll be going through these options in more detail (and with pics) in the next section.
5 Pink Shirt And Pants Combinations
Now that we’ve gone through the main guidelines to keep in mind, here are some practical examples of combinations you could try out.
If you were looking for the dressiest option, the pink shirt and neutral pants combo (eg. grey, black, or off-white/cream) would usually be the way to go.
The other options – including the monochromatic scheme – are more casual looking. They’d be better suited to smart-casual settings and nothing more formal than that.
Monochromatic Scheme
Example: Pink Shirt With Maroon Pants
A monochromatic combo would consist of a pink shirt paired with pants in a different shade within the spectrum of red.
It’s important to be careful here. For example, a dark pink shirt paired with light pink pants is hard for anyone to pull off.
Keep things simple and muted.
Go for a light pink shirt paired with pants in a dark and muted shade of red such as maroon or burgundy.
This looks great, especially in the summer.
However, notice how it looks pretty casual. Pairing warm colors like this can work well, but can sometimes be a little too vibrant and in-your-face.
The trick really is to keep the pants dark and muted enough for it to work. Stick to that formula and it’s tough to go wrong.
Pink Shirt With Neutral Pants
Example: Pink Shirt With Off-White, Grey, Or Black Pants
This is the easiest and dressiest option on the list. If you’re worried about underdressing, it’s probably the best option.
“Neutral” pants include whites, off-whites, cream, beige, navy blue, grey, and black.
Pants in any of these colors would work well with any pink shirt you can think of. Neutrals are great because they’re background colors that are super-easy to color-match.
You don’t really need to think about it. It just works.
If you want to go the extra mile, however, consider going for some light vs dark contrast.
If you’re wearing a light pink shirt, go for a dark and neutral pair of pants (eg. charcoal grey or black).
On the other hand, if you were wearing a dark pink shirt, consider a light and neutral pair of pants instead (eg. light grey, cream, or beige).
Contrast works well.
Pink Shirt With Warm-Colored Pants
Example: Pink Shirt With Light Brown Or Khaki Pants
Ultimately, the monochromatic pink shirt and maroon pants combo we looked at earlier was a combination of warm-colored pants.
But there are other warm colors you could combine with a pink shirt for a higher-contrast look.
Remember, pink is a warm color in itself.
Pairing warm colors with other warm colors does work, but it isn’t quite as easy as it is to pair cool colors with other cool colors.
It can often come across as pretty eye-catching and a little too “loud” at times, especially for those with a more subdued and laid-back personality.
However, it works.
Once again, the trick is to choose subtle and muted shades of warm colors. Doing so makes it hard to go wrong.
For example, a pink shirt with bright yellow pants is tough to pull off.
But a pink shirt with a yellow-brown shade such as khaki is easy to pull off. It’s warm and attention-grabbing, but not too in-your-face.
Pink Shirt With Cool-Colored Pants
Example: Pink Shirt With Blue Pants
As you can see from the color wheel posted above, cool-colored pants include blues, greens, and purples.
Out of all them, blue pants would generally be the easiest to pair with a pink shirt.
Green pants would lead to more contrast with a pink shirt and can work too – we’ll go through this combo in the next section.
But the pink shirt and blue pants combo is a better option if you’re looking for more subtlety.
As always, going for a relatively dark and muted shade of blue pants would always make it easier.
A light pink shirt with navy or indigo blue pants, for example, would look great.
Pink Shirt With Complimentary Pants
Example: Pink Shirt With Green Pants
Complimentary colors lie opposite each other on the color wheel. Referring back to the trusted color wheel above, you can see that pink lies opposite green.
Pink and green could therefore be considered “complementary” to each other as a result.
Complimentary colors are very high-contrast and pairing the two leads to an attention-grabbing outcome as a result.
But it works.
A pink shirt does work with green pants, but it’s important to realize just how casual it’s going to look due to the contrast.
Sticking to pants in muted shades of green such as olive and sage should make things easier, however.
Just avoid wearing the combination to anything more formal than smart-casual and you should be fine.
Conclusion
Pink shirts aren’t difficult to color-match with pants, but it’s hard to deny that some colors will be more appropriate than others in certain settings.
It really depends on where you’re going and how much contrast you want in your outfit.
Ultimately, there’s likely to be an option for you no matter what you’re dressing for.
Enjoy.
Ready Sleek founder. Obsessed with casual style and the minimalist approach to building a highly functional wardrobe. Also a fan of classic, vintage hairstyles.
