Growing up as a woman of color, it’s safe to say that my experiences with makeup were a struggle. I remember in 8th grade there was another brown girl in my math class who was a similar complexion of me and decided to wear a full face of foundation to class.
When she walked in, her whole face was a lighter skin tone than her neck. She was walking confidently with her step around everyone until I heard another girl come up to her and ask, “Are you wearing makeup?” She nodded with a small smile on her face. The girl replied, “Yeah, I can tell,” she paused to point to her neckline and said, “Your face doesn’t match your neck.” Even though I wasn’t the one who the comment was directed to, in a weird way I felt like I was also being attacked.
From that moment on, a fear of wearing makeup for my skin tone grew within me. As someone of color, it took a good eight or nine years ago to find makeup for my skin tone.
Fast forward to today, the makeup industry today has definitely made a breakthrough in focusing on creating more diverse and inclusive makeup for all skin tones. So, here are some makeup brands that have a great inclusive line for makeup.
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Colourpop
This is one of my personal favorite makeup lines. First of all, where else can you find great price and great quality for makeup? Their concealers and foundation come with a variety of skin tone options and I can give my definite personal recommendation that the quality is amazing, especially their matte full – coverage concealer.
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Fenty Beauty
First of all, it’s Rihanna. That’s it. Rihanna. Her makeup care beauty line caters to a diverse range of skin tones as well with her award winning Pro Filt’r foundation, concealer, contour kits, eyeliner, lip gloss and her highlight– my personal favorite is the Baby Bomb. The makeup brand offers something for women of every skin tone and you see her push for inclusivity even in how there are models of all backgrounds and skin tones and sizes modeling for the company.
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Milk Makeup
Milk Makeup not only offers a wide range of skin tones in their makeup lines, but they are great with their inclusivity as a company. They are a cruelty free company and 100% vegan. Also, they focus on gender and sexuality diversity within their brand through their models. Personally, I haven’t used anything yet from here, but my friends have told me that their KUSH High Volume mascara is a great investment.
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Maybelline New York
Now, we all love a good drug store makeup deal. Maybelline’s Fit Me Matte + Poreless Foundation has been one of the rare drugstore brands that offer 40 different shades for foundation. Plus, it’s decent quality and worth the price, so you can be looking good on a budget.
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Jackie Aina Palette x Anastasia Beverly Hills
One of my favorite YouTubers, Jackie Aina, recently collaborated with Anastasia Beverly Hills to drop a limited-edition eyeshadow palette. My roommate recently bought it and the color selection was phenomenal with a variety of different colors from plum brown to deep peach to purple. Jackie specifically designed the eyeshadow palette to be inclusive to women of color and all skin tones because oftentimes in eyeshadow palettes, the transition shades on darker skin tones look very white and chalkish compared to what they look like on lighter skin tones. In other words, Jackie definitely thought of it all with this palette.