L’OREAL PARIS TRANSITIONS INTO DIVERSITY
In 2015 I was invited to be a contestant in L’Oreal the Brush Contest, which was a year after I had won Simon Cowell’s the You Generation Competition, and sadly received no press release. I was very busy and working internationally as a makeup artist, I remember when the contest was scheduled, I was actually in Dallas Texas working at Beauty Con so I was dubious about whether I should take part or not.
The incentive that tempted me, was that originally the prize was advertised as a cash prize of 75,000 EUR and the chance to design makeup for L’Oreal Paris, which obviously is a lot of money and what I wanted to break into, product design, I felt that I could do something really provocative with prosthetic makeup and build on my work with male to female transformations and trans representation. It was really a lovely feeling because it was fan-voted and I wondered if I would be able to overcome the feeling that I was being minimised. So the format of the Brush contest was to submit a video, then fans would vote on the video, and the competition was presented as a digital campaign with tutorials and online advertisements for L’Oreal Paris.
During the contest, many people were using a voting system to cheat and the whole thing was a bit of a fiasco, I was in the top 3 vote wise and suddenly people were adding these vote systems, and it delayed the whole interview section. I found out in LA that I was to fly back to the UK to be in the campaign videos and the presentation online. So I was majorly jetlagged, I expected to meet Val Garland and Cheryl Cole who were judges, and I was elated but worn to the bone. There were four other contestants, they were all lovely and I’ve kept in touch with them through social media and they’re all majorly talented people. In the hotel room, I found out that the prize money was actually not gonna happen, it was a prize to assist Val Garland as a makeup artist in Canne. What a wonderful opportunity for a fledgling makeup artist, for me it was an incredible waste of time. That was not why I was there and I was pretty deflated.
The judges actually didn’t come over to say anything to the contestents, it just felt like everyone was annoyed to be there. I filmed some footage and thought, let’s get as much I can, it’s gonna be another You Gen and I can’t be put into that situation again. Don’t get me wrong, it was still a massive honor to have been the first trans person to be involved in a L’Oreal Paris campaign. I had also done Rimmel (in collaboration with Beamly) that year, which was awesome. I felt that it was the real accomplishment, but again it was never promoted. I was so tired I almost fell asleep waiting with the contestents and I had to order some room service, it was just a very long and rewardless day.
I had my model, we had to do something on a stage with L’Oreal products, I decided this was not gonna work for me and I took every camera opportunity to get footage. I remember talking to the model when we were doing the contest and I just said, ‘Honey I’m really sorry… but I’m gonna make you pink - because I don’t want to do this.’ I colored her face in with red lipstick. She was a great sport, the look was from my David Bowie inspired tutorials with the colourful contours. Back in that era of Youtube you couldn’t find a tutorial that used a red blusher as a contour, it was like outrageous at the time and I thought it would better promote my videos lol!!!!!
Noone came over to greet us or take a photo after, it was incredibly strange and I remember the staff in the audience from L’Oreal all coming to me after saying how awesome my work was which just confused me evenmore. Val followed me my social media and I was like… I felt that there was a mix up between the L’Oreal team, who loved the fact I was trans and there and knew I was kind of like a killer whale amongst guppies, but the organization of the competition put a dampener on everything. Sadly, because of this, I was approached later that year about whether I would be interested in being in the televised commercial for L’Oreal Paris and I was a bit scared to say yes. I also don't want to be the example of someone who is put in a campaign as 'other', I feel that my work speaks for itself and I should be considered next to any model to sell makeup, I've done that successfully for ten years, and I did not feel at that time it was a great fit. But I love L’Oreal and I will be forever grateful to have been the first trans person to have broken that boundary, as a result of my amazing audience on Youtube who voted me into that position.
So let’s speed on - because in 2017 I worked with Jessica Blackler who organized her company under L’Oreal Innovations, based on my trans tutorials. Full article is listed on this website. It was an amazing feat and we launched to great success. The next big moment was to actually be contacted to speak internally with Ellis who helms the Out @ L’Oreal movement and talk about our stories putting the brand together and my personal journey as a transgender person in the beauty industry. It was amazing and Ellis has been super effective internally because now the company offers support to LGBT+ people, my experience and how things have unfolded in my career has served as an example and I’ve been fortunate enough to do more campaigns with L’Oreal brands in 2020.
L’Oreal Paris is an incredible company, we received the entire makeup range which was lovely. I am forever interested in creating new work with them in inclusivity.
