Behind the Beauty: Fara Homidi on Building Fashion’s Most Coveted Beauty Brand

Welcome to Behind the Beauty, a recurring series spotlighting the power players driving the beauty world forward. In it, these leaders muse on every facet of their journey, from where they draw inspiration to the breakthrough advice that has transformed their careers.

As a child, makeup artist Fara Homidi would watch her mother sweep emerald green across her eyes and stain her lips burnt sienna. “I was mesmerized by the colors and the textures, but also how confident and transformed she would look right afterwards,” she recalls over Zoom on the first day of fashion month. “I dreamt of the day I could hold a compact and apply my makeup and have that feeling of womanhood.”

That early fascination never left her. “I have always been infatuated with makeup,” says Homidi, who was born in Afghanistan and raised in Fremont, California. Beginning at age 11, she worked in her mother’s beauty supply store while devouring ‘90s fashion magazines—InStyle among them—studying editorials and memorizing the names behind the images, wondering how one entered that world.

By 17, Homidi began working at a local outpost of cult-favorite brand Prescriptives, known for its custom foundation shade matching. “That’s where I really cut my teeth on undertones, different skin types, pores, ages—figuring out how to work on a wide range of complexions,” she says. After an equally formative stint managing a MAC Pro store in Los Angeles, she moved to New York in 2008 to freelance, assisting industry heavyweights such as Lucia Pieroni and Aaron DeMay for a short period before striking out solo. “I was bold enough to go on my own pretty quickly,” says Homidi. “It was the harder road because no one knows you—but I took it.”

At a time in the late 2000s when glossy, hyper-digital perfection ruled, Homidi quietly resisted. “My makeup has never fit that,” she says. Instead, she built a reputation for her light hand—combining raw skin and lived-in finishes with “emotional” color play (as seen at Eckhaus Latta’s fall show, for which she crafted a “mottled blue eye” look inspired by hand-painted canvases)—an aesthetic that has made her one of the fashion industry’s most in-demand artists, shaping influential runway shows, editorial shoots, and luxury campaigns for houses including Off-White, Coperni, Miu Miu, and Hermès.

Years later, her distinct vision evolved into her namesake makeup brand, Fara Homidi Beauty, which she launched in 2023. “If I really dig back into why I started this, it’s because I didn’t feel like there were any beauty brands that spoke to me,” says Homidi. What she created instead sits firmly, as she puts it, in “that unapologetic fashion luxury space”—a world where every detail, from the pigments to the packaging, is executed with couture-level precision. “My product ethos is that I want everything malleable, smudgeable, buildable, movable, breathable.” And the packaging? Sculptural, sumptuous, and saturated in the brand’s signature powder blue—a shade that’s not just fresh, but a symbol of positivity and optimism. “If you wake up with a cloudless sky, all the possibilities are available to you,” she muses.

Each launch in Homidi’s finely tuned makeup collection combines uncompromising formulations with meticulously calibrated shades, from her debut Essential Lip Compact, an instant favorite among It girls, to her latest drop, the Cream Cashmere Soft Shadow trios. With pigments that melt into the lids (“Yes, it’s going to crease!” she says), the trios are designed to create the ultimate “lived-in eye,” whether softly contoured in brown, smoldering in black, or washed in electric blue. “If you’ve ever slept in your eyeshadow accidentally, it looks better the next morning—so why not have a product that gives you that look from the start?” she poses.

Here, InStyle chats with Homidi about breaking into the industry, honing her singular aesthetic, and building her brand.

On how she broke into the industry :

At 17, I started in retail at Prescriptives because I wanted to understand undertones and complexions deeply. Later, when I took the operations role at MAC Pro, it was because I wanted to learn the business side. I always knew artistry wasn’t enough—I wanted to understand how it all worked.

When I moved to New York in 2008, I assisted for a short period before deciding to go out on my own. It had its ups and downs because no one knows you, and it’s the harder road. If you assist someone for five years, you’re a shoo-in. But I took the more difficult road.  But I’m a hustler. I built relationships with photographer and stylist assistants, collaborated on extracurricular shoots to build our books, got represented, and eventually began working on luxury campaigns, editorials, and runway. It took time, but I found my people. That’s really what it’s all about.

On the influences that shaped her aesthetic:

Between 2008 and 2010, everything was oversaturated, over-perfected, glossy digital imagery. My makeup has never fit that, and neither did my taste. I could appreciate it, but it wasn’t for me. Around 2010, I was commissioned for a job with photographer Zoë Ghertner. When I looked at her book, it felt like the antithesis of what was happening—film, rawness, something completely different. It felt like exactly what I wanted to go into. We started building together. Then another photographer, Stevie Dance, came along, and I loved her vision of women. She built worlds and had a very particular view of what it meant to be sexy—from a woman’s perspective. With Zoe, Stevie, and Talia Chetrit, we were all a little rebellious to what was going on. It was rare to see super-raw skin with a big look or almost nothing, yet it still said so much. We were leading that way.

On why she launched Fara Homidi Beauty:

I started daydreaming about having a brand around 2015. I thought it would happen in my 50s or 60s. But when I told my husband the idea—the products, the ethos, what it would look like—he said, “You have to do this. If you don’t, somebody else will.” If I really dig back into why I started it, it’s because I didn’t feel like there were any beauty brands that spoke to me; someone who’s super into fashion, music, film, nature, traveling. Even luxury houses that did couture and handbags would commercialize their beauty in a way that didn’t feel as detail-oriented or as considered.

When you buy a coveted bag or shoe, every detail matters. But beauty often felt mass market—lots of plastic, less luxury. I wanted to create something that sat in that unapologetic fashion luxury space, infusing my retail knowledge and trend-building experience into products that were easy for everyday people to use. I’m usually mixing multiple things to get to a shade or texture, so I wanted to give you that pre-mixed.

On getting the brand off the ground:

I told my team early on, “I’m not cutting any corners. These materials are going to cost what they cost, and I just want to make the best thing.” They had to scramble to figure out how to make that vision happen within budget. Every manufacturer has MOQs, minimum order quantities, you have to negotiate. The big challenge was creating something without compromises on a budget. It was beyond hard. Sometimes customers say, “Your lip gloss is so heavy, it could have been made of plastic.” And I’m like, “If I could have made it in plastic, it would’ve come out three years ago.” But what I want to offer is packaging that is sustainably minded to the best of my ability with current technology, coupled with innovation in formulation.

On her signature blue:

I did an exercise where I printed out all my work and asked, “What are my favorite things I’ve ever done?” When I looked at it, everything had that powder blue in it. My husband calls me Blue Sky. I love the ocean and blue skies. That color became very visible to me. I thought it would just be details, but my branding team said, “Go balls to the wall and make it full blue.” When I saw it rendered, I couldn’t stop thinking about it. I was like, “I have to have that thing.” And if I feel that way, I think people are going to feel that way.

On what defines her product ethos:

My product ethos is that I want everything malleable, smudgeable, buildable, movable, breathable. I’ve been told for years that everything needs to be budge-free, 24-hour wear, not move. But it’s totally going to crease and it’s totally going to look sexy and we’re going to love it. I believed in this way before this trend hit. I really believe it doesn’t have to be perfect.

On how she wants people to feel using her products:

I want people to feel pride and joy in taking that moment to touch themselves up. I’m excited to see people have fun again with makeup. Someone who never wears eye makeup sending me a photo of a pop of blue in the corner of her eye—that’s real influence. That’s exciting.

On her proudest moment since launching her brand:

My proudest moments are when I’m in a room with my core team and we’ve just pulled something off—an in-store Sephora event or something huge—and I think, I’m so lucky I get to work with all my favorite people. Getting to build something that’s a hundred percent yours with people you love is such a luxury. That’s probably my proudest moment.

On her top pieces of advice for other founders:

Make sure your business side is locked down. Creative is difficult, but if you don’t have a strong business side, the walls will come crumbling down. Taxes, regulatory, overseas selling, projections, retailer timelines—building a team to support you on the business side is the most important thing. And creatively: put blinders on and tap into what makes you tick. Nothing is stupid. Literally nothing is stupid. Don’t second-guess yourself.

On the future of Fara Homidi Beauty:

Global expansion is our number one focus right now. Also, rounding out the collection so you can truly do a full face using Fara Homidi. Instead of having huge big ideas of “we’re going to be here,” I’m more like, let’s stay the course because this is already hard. Stay the course and don’t falter.

Read the original article on InStyle