Don't forget the famous  “nightgown” made out of black satin and fur, to stay in her apartments and possibly receive guests. She surely liked black and brown, but there are mentions of Henry offering her purple and red fabrics, for exemple after they fought about the shirts made by Katherine of Aragon, and she probably had them made into gowns. We musn't forget that dying at this time wasn't as easy as today. It was not just putting the dying powder with salt and fabric in a washing machine as we can do today ourselves. They didn't know chimicals dyings. black was the easiest and then the cheapest, as well as the color of respectable ladies who didn't wanted to seduce. The price was the first reason why reformists praised black clothes: the goal was not to spoil money on vanity. Anne probably wore black on an ordinary basis, but richer colors when she could afford them. It's just imagination but I think that since she had olive complexion colors like red or even the same kind of pink  that Elizabeth wore on her teen ager portrait suited her.  As her style is concerned, she followed fashions, but created them as well. Remember the longer sleeves on one side to hide her deformed nail, Alison Weir report that lot of lady copied her. I have a theory about the necklace she always wore: it was not to hide something hideous, as the rumor said, but to make people look elsewhere than at her small cleavage, a strategy used by one of my friends.

I've always imagined Anne as not just a dedicated follower of fashion but as a leader too in that she would take an existing item and add her own personal twist to give her the edge.  She was, after all, a woman who instinctively understood the power of image (which she passed down to her daughter).  And I've always thought that with having a more olive complexion she would have known what colours suited her; black to make her appear more pale, rich browns and gorgeous russets to warm up her skin tone and appear more healthy and lively, deep crimsons for a stunning contrast.  (I've got an olive complexion myself and believe me, you need a lot of either warm or bold colours to liven it up.  Pale, insipid colours are a strict no-no!)

Yeah my skin can get very tanned/dark, especially over the summer months and I've been asked a lot if me or my ancestors didn't come from Italy/Spain/Greece/any other Mediterranean country you can think of!  (The answers no, my ancestors emigrated to New Zealand from Scotland and England.  Which doesn't sound half as exotic!)

As for Anne looking French, off the top of my head i can't remember who said it, but she was once described as “being more French than English” and she definitely favoured the French fashions which she would have picked up from her time there.  France being considered the most fashionable and cultured court at the time its easy to see how Anne would have stood out from the rest of the ladies at the English court.  And sometimes I can't help wondering if maybe Anne didn't come back with a slight accent as well….  

You're olive/darkskinned, Bella and AnneBullen? Lucky you! I have a very pale carnation, which become golden in summer after sunbathing for a while but which make me look sick in winter, no speaking of sleepless nights! My mother is dark skinned too,and I  wish I inherited her carnation! About the colors Anne wore, the definitions of colors in Tudor time weren't the same as in our days. Colors were darker. Remember the portrait of Elizabeth, when she was a teen and lived in Katherine Parr's household: I've always considered it red, but i've read in one of her biography and in Alison Weir's The Lady Elizabeth that it was considered as pink! Not exactly the pink of blossoming cherry trees or apple trees! that's why i think that it was a color that Anne maybe wore.

How pretty! It's cute indeed, Melissa! So Ane appreciated light colors too? And by the way, since dark colors, especially black, make people look thinner, and since Anne was a petite woman, she probably look as breakable as crystal when wearing black!

About the fact of wearing black, there are many possible reasons:

1) Pigments used to prepare black paint were cheaper and easy to buy ( charcoal, etc). It's like printing something, colored inks are more expensive since you need at last three of them, and it's cheaper to use only the black ink and only change this. Maybe being painted in black clothes was a way to save money, since the customer paid for the paint and pigments. if you look at royal portraits ther is more colors, even gold: they didn't have problem with the expense. it was the same thing for cloth: the black dying was cheaper.

2)Since Anne had an olive carnation, she maybe wanted to look paler, just like wearing white when you have a nice tan: there is a better contrast.

3)Black was a respectable color, for married women; maybe Anne wanted to show that she wasn't a potential mistress and lost woman? I've read that colors like green were seen as symbol of women of light virtue, and that's why the lady of Greesleeves is supposed to be a prostitute.

I agree with you Sharon that Anne created her own clothes and surely looked awesome and sophisticated in them. For centuries the best for a French woman was to be original and wear something both unique and suiting her perfectly. Sadly now everybody want to wear the same thing, but Anne surely wanted her gowns to be unique.

And Henry wore a “wife-beater shirt!!!!!”..

IMHO, Anne was a smart cookie who had learnt early she could never compete in the English Rose stakes and made the most of what she had. Her hair was draped in jewels as a she was a maiden and could wear it loose. Her clothes flattered her but looked awarkward on her peers..Her natural( or studied ) grace lent her an air of other worldliness…

Anne had a natural taste for that kind of understatement that never goes out of style…until the next queen sez so.

Anne dressed to make an impact on any who saw her. Whatever she wore made an imprint of the person who saw her, one which was never forgotten. KOA was by the time Anne came of the scene, Dumpy, baggy and a bit loose at the seams. So Anne’s feminine figure was an attraction to not just Henry but others around the court. Anne also had that certain something, that made her look good in anything she wore.
Black was something that was only usually worn when a person was in mourning and not for a fashion statement. So it was pretty daring of Anne to wear black just because she liked the colour.
Good on her. I just wish that some of these so called fashion designers could take a tip from Anne’s wardrobe, and come up with something that looks good, and doesn’t cost a small fortune to buy. The only fashionable item of clothing I have is my birthday suit, and even that’s stretched and out of shape.