February is here, which means it’s time for the annual celebration of Black History Month. In recent years, the beauty industry has undergone some necessary revolutions in the world of inclusivity and diversity in products and branding, including spotlighting countless black-owned and operated companies that cater to everyone’s needs. To kick off Black History Month here are some of our favorite black-owned beauty brands to support during the month and beyond.
Founded in 2017 by KJ Miller and Amanda E. Johnson, Mented is a female-owned beauty brand whose aim is to celebrate all hues and make good quality, cruelty-free makeup that’s “wonderfully inclusive.”
BIPOC-founded and operated and worn by the likes of stars like Lizzo, Nicki Minaj and Cardi B, Stay Golden Cosmetics is your one-stop destination for all things glitz and glitter. Plus, they just launched two can’t-miss Valentine’s Day bundles.
Inspired by the life of Senegalese founder Diarrha N’Diaye-Mbaye, Ami Colé is a clean beauty brand that strives to provide people of color with makeup that is inclusive to all deeper skin tones, helping all users celebrate their inner excellence.
After years of struggling with dry lips Kristen Noel Crawley created KNC Beauty in an effort to create long-term, effective solutions for chapped, dehydrated lips. Not only do her famous lip masks, eye masks and balms provide much needed hydration, they’re also are absolutely adorable.
Crafted without parabens, sulfates synthetic fragrances or phthalates, OUI the People is a sustainable body-care brand that celebrates differences and elevates our individual strengths through products that cater to any and all body-care needs, from razor bumps to KP.
Created to suit and protect melanated skin, Black Girl Sunscreen moisturizes, fights sun damage, fine lines, and hyperpigmentation without leaving a white cast.
Created by the one and only Tracee Ellis Ross, PATTERN hair care offers an array of hair-care products created for coily, curly and tight hair textures in everything from styling creams to hot tools.
Operating under the important ideology that “you make skin look good, not the other way around” Topicals Skincare uses only ingredients scientifically proven by third-party studies and an advisory board in order to create safe, effective skin-care products for all skin types.
Vegan and cruelty-free, EADEM is a skin-care brand that utilizes patented Smart Melanin Technology to gently and effectively care for skin of color.
The first and only hair-care brand specifically focused on women who sweat, Sunday II Sunday offers an array of hair-care products that are specifically designed for active women in order to remove sweat, balance hair moisture and help you transition from workout to work seamlessly.
Both luxurious and solution-oriented, BROWN GIRL jane is a black female owned and operated beauty and wellness brand that focuses on revolutionizing what it means to “feel, look and live well” through plant-based, clean products in the form of everything from fragrance to candles to supplements.
Founded by Nigerian-born Sharon Cuter, Uoma is an inclusive beauty brand striving to redefine the rules of diversity in the beauty industry. Uoma offers a range of makeup products that are forward-thinking, fierce and, of course, beautiful.
Literally meaning “full of life” and “earth and nature,” Briogeo is a clean hair-care brand suitable for all hair types and textures, inspired by founder Nancy Twine’s familial history of creating beauty products from scratch.
54 Thrones was created with the intention to honor, celebrate and elevate traditional African beauty rituals through a clean yet luxurious and decadent line of products that pay homage to Africa’s natural resources and the African culture’s commitment to generational beauty traditions.
Beautstat founder Ron Robinson is a renowned cosmetic chemist who created innovative products for several industry giants before creating his own brand. Since, he has accumulated endless praise for his effective, transparent and high-quality skin-care products.
Inspired by his own struggles to find skin-care products that suited his needs throughout his extensive career in fashion, founder Dorion Renaud created Buttah, a skin-care brand centered on the needs of men and women with melanin skin tones.
“Inspired by bald folks but works for everyone,” MANTL is a skin, face and scalp-care brand founded alongside mental health advocate and Queer Eye star, Karamo Brown, in hopes of challenging outdated standards of masculinity and redefining what it is to be a well-groomed man.
Co-owned by Hannah Diop and actress Issa Rae, Sienna Naturals is a hair-care brand focusing on textured hair. Backed by science and using natural ingredients and clean chemistry, Sienna Naturals aims to redefine hair care for textured hair with a larger focus on hair and scalp health.
Created originally as a way of helping solve her children’s eczema, founder and CEO Janell Stephens developed hair-care line Camille Rose with the intention of creating healthy, happy hair.
Dedicated to lifting up the voices of people of color and bringing black and brown skin into the conversation of skin care, Hyper Skin is a skin-care brand that is “hyper-focused on formulas that treat the unique needs of skin of color and that work well on Black skin, on brown skin and on all skin tones.”
Inspired by founder Sienna Brown’s life-long commitment to never going anywhere without a lip gloss at the ready, Glosshood is a beauty brand that celebrates your inner child and values inclusivity at its core.
At the forefront of natural hair care from the beginning, Charlotte Mensah created her namesake brand after accumulating years of knowledge on how to care for and style afro/mixed and all curly hair types using only organic, sustainably sourced oils.
Created by TV personality La La Anthony, INALA is a rice-water based hair-care brand that focusses on nurturing and repairing all hair types.
Sisters Naana Boayke, Abena Slowe and Akua Okeunseinde founded Karité with the mission of creating products that harnessed the power of the raw, natural shea butter that the three grew up using in Ghana. Karité products use all-natural, antioxidant-rich, high concentrations of raw, unrefined shea butter and palm oil all sustainably sourced from Ghana.
After struggling with skin-health issues like razor bumps, acne and post-inflammatory hyperpigmentation, Patrick Boateng II founded Ceylon in hopes of providing black men with effective skin-care products that account for the melanin in their skin.
Holy Curls
Operating under the mission of “undoing the myths of the curl, untwirling it and showing the curl for what it truly is,” Holy Curls provides natural, cruelty-free hair-care products curated towards every individual’s curl needs.
ENSŌ Apothecary
Originally making soaps from scratch in her kitchen, founder Tamara Johnson created ENSŌ Apothecary (a body care and wellness brand) with her focus on a “heart-centered mission to end the cycle of abuse and trauma by optimizing one’s self-care routine through holistic empowerment practices.”
Created by self-proclaimed “lipstick junkie” Aishetu Fatima Dozie, Bossy Cosmetics is a global beauty brand that prides itself on empowering women through bold, beautiful products.
Inspired by her own personal struggles with persistent scalp itch, Sherrel Sampson created Canviiy as a way to provide botanical-based hair and scalp products to consumers who want to tackle their itch from the source.
Aesthetician to the stars Shani Darden takes a personalized, curated approach to skin-health with her potent skin-care line created to provide products that she couldn’t find on the market.
Inspired by founder Bea Dixon’s longterm battle with bacterial vaginosis, The Honey Pot is the first-ever brand of natural, plant-based and herb-influenced feminine care products.
After suffering from severe traction alopecia, founder Lulu Cordero turned to unique hair-care solutions, creating a line of clean, organic hair-care products for curly hair that harness the Afro-Dominican traditions she grew up with.
With the goal of creating a line of products to fill a gap in the mens grooming industry—shaving products made expressly for black men—Tristan Walker founded Bevel and has since produced an extensive range of skin, hair, and body shaving products for me.
Offering both skin-care and makeup products, Juvia’s Place celebrates the “rebels, rulers, and queens” of African Kingdoms who honored beauty and praising the techniques they used that still shape the industry as we know it today.
Founded by celebrity hairstylist Ted Gibson, Starring produces A-list quality products with only the highest quality hair-care ingredients.
