Face the Future: Beauty Brands Changing the Game
Step into our Beauty Hall, home to renegade beauty brands revolutionising our routines
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Face the Future: Beauty Brands Changing the Game
Step into our Beauty Hall, home to renegade beauty brands revolutionising our routines
By: Shannon Peter
We’ve made it our business to hunt out the most disruptive beauty brands to fill the shelves of our iconic Beauty Hall. The kind conjured up by talented visionaries with fresh ideas, eager to change the industry for the better. These are the renegade brands that have changed the way we think about the purpose of beauty. They’ve given us perfumes powerful enough to change our mood, makeup that provides the kind of glow once only possible at the mercy of a filter, and skincare products that encourage an altogether more mindful beauty experience. This is beauty in beta.
Read More: Seek professional skin advice in a bottle courtesy of these expert-led skincare brands
The Easy-Yet-Expert Beauty Brand
As one of the world’s most revered makeup artists with an encyclopaedic knowledge of beauty history, few know what constitutes a great product quite like Lisa Eldridge. And thankfully for us, she now makes her own, from skincare-grade highlighters to her signature range of pillowy-soft lipsticks, each one translating often tricky professional techniques into formulas that do all the hard work for you.
The Hero: Lisa Eldridge Beauty The Seamless Skin Foundation, £44
Not matte, nor particularly dewy, with this formula, Eldridge has somehow managed to bottle authentic-looking skin – just with added radiance. Its intelligence hinges on Filmexel, a clever biopolymer that sets to an invisible veil over the skin, providing a lifting, smoothing effect.
Read More: The best Lisa Eldridge beauty products, according to the founder herself
SHOP Lisa Eldridge Beauty
The Vibe-Shifting Fragrance Brand
The ultimate feel-good beauty brand, Vyrao exists at the intersection of energetic healing and perfumery, utilising the brain’s innate connection between scent and emotion. Founded by creative director Yasmin Sewell, each blend contains ingredients specifically chosen for their ability to shift your mood or raise your spirit.
The hero: Vyrao Witchy Woo, £135
Charged with Herkimer diamond crystal (the stone purported to provide clarity and uplifting energy), this deep and earthy fragrance features thorny roses, warming nutmeg and velvety musks. The effect is enveloping, making you feel ready to take on the day.
Read More: The perfect scent for you is written in the stars, or so says our zodiac perfume guide
SHOP VYRAO
The Your-Skin-But-Better Makeup Brand
The brainchild of legendary makeup artist Bobbi Brown, you’re right to expect big things from Jones Road. She’s managed to distil her years of expertise and signature no-makeup-makeup look into a curated collection of smart, simple and easy-to-master formulas for every skin type and tone. This is makeup made for the modern day.
The Hero: Jones Road Miracle Balm, £36
This tinted balm does near-magical things to your skin. It lends a light veil of complexion-enhancing colour to wherever you choose to apply it, as well as a soft sheen that makes you look like you’ve just emerged from a facial. And even if you use it everyday (which you undoubtedly will), the pot seems to go on and on and on.
Read More: The key to makeup that goes the distance? First learning how to prep skin for makeup
SHOP Jones Road Beauty
The Glow-Guaranteed Skincare Brand
She’s the master of product formulation and a bonafide expert in glowing skin, so it’s no wonder why skincare lovers the world over have long built their routines around Sunday Riley’s expertly-crafted products. This is the brand to turn to if you want efficacious formulas that are a joy to use.
The Hero: Sunday Riley Good Genes Glycolic Acid Treatment 30ml, £70
A reigning favourite loved by experts, editors and Liberty Loyalists alike, this acid-based exfoliant sends a generous dose of glycolic acid deep into skin, in a bid to slough away dead skin cells and purge pores. Better still, the irritation often associated with AHA products is tempered by the inclusion of fermented prickly pear extract.
Read More: Learn how to layer your routine the right way with our guide to the correct order of skincare products
SHOP SUNDAY RILEY
The Irreverent Fragrance Brand
Few indie fragrance brands have managed to capture hearts and minds quite like D.S. & Durga. Founded by husband and wife duo David Seth and Kavi Moltz, the brand creates irreverent, original, transportive scents that immerse you in other places, times and emotions, all in a single spritz and with plenty of humour to boot.
The Hero: D.S. & Durga Steamed Rainbow Eau de Parfum, £155"
With any D.S. & Durga scent, you can never be too sure what you're going to get from just the first impression of the name and bottle alone. And Steamed Rainbow is no exception. It melds ingredients of every colour of the rainbow, from violets to almond flower via mandarin, all softened by the essence of watery steam. Trust us, it's a delight.
Read More: Learn the art of matching perfumes to occasions
SHOP D.S. & DURGA
The TCM-Inspired Skincare Brand
With Muihood, founder Charlotte Yau hopes to translate the 5,000 year old medical system of Traditional Chinese Medicine to a new generation. In skincare terms? That means utilising some of its key herbs and botanicals to create nourishing formulas that tend to the health and energy of the skin.
The Hero: Muihood Good Chi Cleansing Balm, £30
Prompting a more meditative take on cleansing, this balm encourages you to go slow, and enjoy all the joy there is to be found in this daily ritual. It's smooth texture basically begs to be massaged in, and comes charged with herbs and ingredients loved throughout TCM (think: soybean oil, ginseng root and goji berry), each chosen to nourish, protect and enrich the skin.
The Trendsetting Skincare Brand
Sure, liquid exfoliants are ten to the penny now, but it was Biologique Recherche that really brought acid ingredients to the fore with its iconic Lotion P50. Once only available in clinics, the brand’s range of toners manage to exfoliate, regulate sebum and restore skin’s optimal pH, leaving all that use it with the soft, glowing skin of their dreams.
The Hero: Biologique Recherche Lotion P50, £75
There’s a Lotion P50 for every skin type, but this is the OG, the strongest formula that yields the most transformative results, perfect for anyone with particularly tolerant skin.
Read More: Rise and shine with the ultimate morning skincare routine
SHOP Biologique Recherche
The Holistic Beauty Brand
When Jena Covello started exploring natural medicine and healing remedies to soothe her own symptoms, she had no idea it would lead to this: Agent Nateur, her luxury skincare line that squeezes only the very best vitamins, minerals, oils and plant extracts out of the natural world. Her take is a holistic one, feeding every part of the skin-body-mind ecosystem through effective skincare, bodycare, supplements and so much more.
The Hero: Agent Nateur h o l i ( r o s e ) N4 Deodorant, £27
The brand’s first – and flagship – product, this deodorant is formulated without aluminium. With a soft and subtle rose scent, it’s about as elegant and elevated as deodorant gets.
Read More: Liberty makes a case for indulgent at-home beauty treatments
