I’ve always loved makeup. I was introduced to makeup as a child due to my initial obsession with America’s top model and my experience as a competitive dancer. When I’m having a recital or a dance competition, or if I’m performing in Nutcracker, we will do the makeup for the show. I would watch a lot of YouTube videos with my sister and experiment with different makeup techniques. Every day makeup for me is meditative — a moment when I prepare for the day. I love my makeupand for years, one problem I had was not being able to find a foundation shade that matched my skin tone.
I’m biracial, so finding a skin tone that matches my parents’ mix of different skin tones is frustratingly difficult. Shades can be too orange or too beige or have cold tones that turn gray. Every makeup lover knows that if your foundation is lost, it can completely ruin the look. For a long time, many beauty brands have treated women of color like a trailblazer and enlisted beauty influencers, like Jackie Aina and Alissa Ashleywho have expressed their frustration at not being able to find shades that work for them, calling for beauty brands to roll out some shades of white and only three to five shades for people with skin brown and women of color own beauty brands like Pat McGrath and Rhianna I’ve seen a big change in the number of shades included when a new platform is released. I’ve listed six brands as my go-to for the shade-inclusive foundation, my personal favorite being Nars. I use Radiant Longwear Foundation, and I swear by it.
Keep scrolling to see the other five brands on my list and other beauty products like the holy grail that I have in my makeup bag.
