Libby Appleby, 37, was told her babies would look so similar they would need to be “marked with ink” to tell them apart.
But she was surprised when Amelia was born with dark skin, black hair and brown eyes, and her sister Jasmine with fair skin, blue eyes and light curls.
“We get a lot of funny looks when we tell people the girls are actually identical,” she said.
Despite their different skin tones, they are genetically identical and are thought to be the first of their kind in the country.
Appleby said: “When they were born, we were flabbergasted. They look like they’re different races. Amelia is the spitting image of her dad, while Jasmine is a mini version of me.”
Appleby, of County Durham, said strangers assume the twins – who have just celebrated their first birthday – are step-sisters.
The mom and her partner of three years, 40-year-old electrical engineer Tafadzwa Madzimbamuto, found out she was pregnant in June 2014.
Three months later, they were told they were expecting twins and medics at University of Durham Hospital warned they would be difficult to tell apart.
Appleby said medics “gasped” when they delivered the girls – who are monozygotic – formed in the same embryo but developed in separate sacs.
She added: “We put them next to each other in a cot and couldn’t believe how different they were.
“Doctors told us the chances of mixed race [identical] twins are one in a million. We were thrilled they were so unique.”
A sample of Appleby’s placenta confirmed the twins are 100% genetically identical, despite them looking nothing alike.
Dr Claire Steves, from the Department of Twin Research, said multiple genes control skin colour and although identical twins are very likely to share them completely, it is not definite.
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