Barbieis like the Beyonceof dolls.
it’s possible for you to find them featured on@BarbieStyle’s Instagram page.
ALLURE: How did this partnership with Barbie come about?
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SIR JOHN:We found each other.
That’s always how it starts out.
ALLURE:I love that.
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We’re seeing so many different-looking dolls that are more representative of actual people.
What kind of vibe were you going for when you were creating the looks for this?
Iloveskin, I love a natural approach to skin, but I [also] love a statement.
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I love a statement lip or some sort of punctuation around the eyes.
That is where I wanted to pull from for our first run together.
ALLURE: What was the process like working with Barbie on these looks?
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SJ:It’s been fun really.
It’s super, super cool, and we’ve been big kids with it.
This has been the quickest, most adjacent journey to my childhood I’ve worked on in a while.
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I’m smiling because I’m thinking about the process.
There has been such an easy, symbiotic relationship there.
I love the team.
SJ:So many early memories!
My cousins were obsessed and they used to play with Barbie, like Cinderella or dress up.
They had a Barbie town.
We breathed life into the town.
ALLURE: Let’s talk a bit about where beauty is going right now.
But it seems COVID has changed that.
We’re leaving a heavily contoured, heavily saturated era of makeup.
What did that translate to?
More luminous skin, fewer breakouts, less uneven pigmentation, less time in the sun.
Even after we leave this pandemic, I think there’s going to be a shift.
And if you know anything about my work, I’m such an eye guy.
It comes from [doing performance makeup] with stadium lights: Super Bowls, Coachella.
I love impactful looks that are still editorial.ALLURE: I also want to delve into Black beauty.
I feel like we’re seeing a lot of Black people lean into ourtried-and-true beauty aesthetics.
We’re owning our own beauty, owning our own narrative.
We’re doing less contouring on the nose.
We’re embracingourskin and it doesn’t matter if we’re getting the credit or not.
We’re able to own it in a way that we haven’t in years prior.
Getting inspiration should come from inside [us].
It shouldn’t come from the runways or the red carpet.
It’s like, what did my grandmother do?
How does she line her eyes?
What earrings does she wear to complement her swag in the ’70s?
What did my mom use to do in the ’80s and ’90s that made her popular?
All of that is the culmination of who we are today.
We’ve had the baseline appropriation conversation, and it was averyimportant one.
We’re putting Black faces back on these styles, and letting that say it all.
We are sharing stories, sharing what makesus.
There’s pride in it.
I think 2020 has been the ultimate equalizer.
It was a unifying experience.
The future of beauty for me is being vocal, is sharing, and continuing to talk about it.
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