Lucky Colours by Season: Five Elements and 24 Solar Terms
The five-element calendar does not start its seasons on the first of a month. Each season begins at a solar term, belongs to one element, and has a colour of its own. Here is the whole year in one place, and two ways to dress by it.
Four seasons, five elements
Spring belongs to Wood, summer to Fire, autumn to Metal and winter to Water. Earth has no season of its own; it sits at the centre and takes the stretch at the end of each season, when one kind of weather is turning into the next. In the calendar those turning stretches are the months of the Dragon, Goat, Dog and Ox branches - roughly April, July, October and January.
So the year reads as a circle: green spring, red summer, white autumn, black winter, with yellow at each hinge. It is the same table that gives the elements their directions and their colours, seen through the calendar.
| Season | Element | Colour family | Begins at the solar term |
|---|---|---|---|
| Spring | Wood | green, teal | Lichun, Start of Spring (around 4 February) |
| Summer | Fire | red, orange, pink, purple | Lixia, Start of Summer (around 5 May) |
| Autumn | Metal | white, grey, silver, gold | Liqiu, Start of Autumn (around 7 August) |
| Winter | Water | black, charcoal, navy, blue | Lidong, Start of Winter (around 7 November) |
| Season ends | Earth | yellow, brown, beige, khaki | the last weeks before each of the four starts |
The 24 solar terms in brief
The solar terms divide the sun's yearly path into twenty-four equal steps, about fifteen days each. They are astronomical, so they fall on nearly the same dates every year, give or take a day. Four of them open the seasons (the 'Li' terms in the table above). Four mark the middle of each season: the spring equinox, the summer solstice, the autumn equinox and the winter solstice. The rest are named for the weather and for farm work: Rain Water, Awakening of Insects, Grain in Ear, White Dew, Frost Descent, Minor Snow.
For the Four Pillars the terms matter more than the lunar months. The year pillar turns at Lichun, not on 1 January, and each month pillar turns at a solar term. That is why the season of your birth - the month branch - carries extra weight when a chart is read, and why the Day Master calculator counts it more heavily than the other branches.
| Season | Its six solar terms |
|---|---|
| Spring | Start of Spring, Rain Water, Awakening of Insects, Spring Equinox, Clear and Bright, Grain Rain |
| Summer | Start of Summer, Grain Buds, Grain in Ear, Summer Solstice, Minor Heat, Major Heat |
| Autumn | Start of Autumn, End of Heat, White Dew, Autumn Equinox, Cold Dew, Frost Descent |
| Winter | Start of Winter, Minor Snow, Major Snow, Winter Solstice, Minor Cold, Major Cold |
Way one: dress with the season
The simplest reading is to wear the season's own family. Greens in spring, warm reds and corals in summer, whites and greys in autumn, navy and black in winter, and soil tones in the weeks when the weather cannot make up its mind. It is the reading closest to how people dress anyway - winter wardrobes really are darker - and it needs no chart at all.
The generating cycle gives a second colour for free. Each season is fed by the one before it, so the previous season's family sits comfortably underneath: navy under spring green, green under summer red, beige under autumn white, white or silver under winter black.
Way two: balance the season
The second reading is older in chart work and has a name: adjusting the climate. A season is not only an element, it is also a temperature. Summer is hot and dry; winter is cold and wet. The tradition holds that a chart born in deep summer is helped first by Water, and a chart born in deep winter is helped first by Fire, whatever else is going on - cool the heat, warm the cold, and only then look at the finer balance. Our calculator follows the same order when it works out the helpful element.
Applied to clothes, this is the instinct to reach for the opposite of the weather: a navy or black linen shirt on the hottest day, a red scarf or a wine-coloured knit in January. In spring and autumn, where the climate is mild, there is little to correct and the season's own colours are enough.
Which way is right for me?
Both are traditional, and they answer different questions. Dressing with the season is about the day outside. Balancing the season is about your own chart: it matters most for people whose birth month sits at one of the two extremes, and it is already built into your helpful element.
The Lucky outfit finder uses your chart first and the calendar second. It starts from your helpful element, then looks at what today's stem, branch and month branch supply. When today brings plenty of what you need, it tells you to let it flow on; when today brings what works against you, it picks the bridge. The season is inside that sum, as the month branch's share of the day.
A year at a glance
From Start of Spring, think green with a base of navy. From Start of Summer, warm colours - and something cool and dark on the hottest days if summer is your birth season. In the last weeks of each season, let beige, camel and brown do the work while the weather turns. From Start of Autumn, white, grey and silver over the warm neutrals you were already wearing. From Start of Winter, navy and black, with red for warmth where the cold bites.
These are traditional correspondences for everyday reference. They are a pleasant way to notice the turning year - not a forecast, and not advice about health.
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Traditional theory · for lifestyle reference. Not medical, financial or personal advice.