behind the scenes of our brand message: all hair is welcome
Two weeks ago we re-introduced ourselves and our brand message to our friends (aka all you beautiful beings). Creating effective haircare is what we do, but we wanted to be totally transparent about who we are. We are a friend to hair, hairstylists, to her, him, them, and you. We support your individuality and provide an inclusive space for self-expression. We believe in the beauty of diversity and power in community. All are welcome, always.
We like to push beauty boundaries and question the current industry standards that don’t make sense. According to us, beauty is all genders, sexualities, and races. Beauty is diversity. Beauty is inclusivity. It’s important to us that you know you will always have a friend in us, and we hope that’s evident in our most recent campaign. So as our friend, we want to share how we brought this message to life.
To dive deeper into the creative side, we spoke to amika’s creative director, Vita Raykhman, who shares inspiration, thoughts on individual beauty, as well as a glimpse into the creative process.
“Riding the subway in New York I have always been struck by how interesting and beautiful the people are. They come from all walks of life and each person's unique amalgamation of genetics, experiences, style and all the things that make us who we are, added up to something that is beautifully layered and complex.
A lot has been said, and so many strides have been made this year in representing diversity. We had to look deep within to ask ourselves what is true diversity as we understand it? The answer was that a lineup of beautiful, young, professional models representing various ethnicities, fell short for us. Our idea of diversity was the complex and vital diversity of New York streets where people don’t fit clear cut types, and each person could take an essay to describe if we tried to put it into words.
This year, as we honed in on what the brand stood for, we understood that our brand name, which means ‘“friend’” is at the heart of everything we do. In our case, being a friend meant creating a platform where everyone felt 100% welcome and at ease to be themselves. All hair is welcome. And so, it felt very natural to simply open our doors and cast people ‘“off the street,’” literally making our community the face of the brand.
The result exceeded our wildest expectations. No casting brief could capture the goldmine of characters and unique beauties that walked through our doors. The resulting campaign imagery, video, and product efficacy demos, focused on the compelling cast of characters; we just stepped back and let them tell us the story of how beautiful individuality really is.”
We promise to continue to celebrate diversity, individuality, and self-expression. We believe in the power of community – and we will continue to listen to you and have conversations with you. For the chance to be featured on The Strand and be part of our ever-growing community of friend, click here.
