40 Shades of Fenty
Everybody I know adores Rihanna. From her eight #1 hit singles, having over 77.8 million followers on her Twitter, to her popular fashion line Fenty x Puma, the fashion, music and beauty icon has taken the masognistic, seemingly segregated entertainment industry by the balls with her new line, Fenty Beauty.
And the digital world's reaction suggests the international star hit it right on the head.
With everyone, from bloggers to other fashion and beauty icons' responding emphatically to the star's new line, while other beauty lines (like that of Kylie Cosmetics) are scrambling to compete, I cannot help but wonder: did Rihanna just change the cosmetic makeup of the beauty industry forever?
It's no secret that the beauty industry is brutal. The ever so sought after
idea of beauty has haunted millions of women's perceptions of what beauty looks like, causing the industry to be difficult to emerge into and even harder to succeed in.
As a woman of color (yes, biracial is a COLOR) I have experienced this firsthand. Growing up, beauty never looked like me, and I never looked like beauty. As I transitioned from playing with dolls to cosmetics, I traded in my Polly Pockets for Maybelline's Fit Me Foundation, which was, at the time, the closest thing I could find to matching my skin tone–and I am not even dark skinned!
Enter Fenty Beauty––this remarkable, inclusive, industry-changing beauty line has broken the boundary between beauty and the common American, creating a bridge between what beauty is and where we are.
With this new line, Rihanna has made beauty accessible to those of colors, background and variety.
With the drop of Fenty Beauty, we are seeing a birth of a movement–one of genuine inclusion, working for the people instead of against them, and one that will absolutely transform how other corporations approach people of color across all industries–particularly in entertainment, beauty, and fashion.
So go put on your Fenty Face and rock out, just the way you are. After all, it's Rihanna approved.