“Beauty needs to be selfish,” Aanam Chasmawala believes, and consistently advocates the philosophy through her blog, What When Wear. It’s only fitting then, that as she enters her 10th year of content creation, Aanam launches Wearified. An ambitious project, Wearified is Aanam’s offering of beauty products that embrace Indian skin tones. Given her love for lipsticks, it was a no-brainer that transfer-proof, one-swipe removal lipsticks would be Wearified’s maiden project. A happy entrepreneur, Aanam takes us through her three years in the making of Wearified, ‘a community-powered brand’.
Aanam’s foundation was to analyse insights from her followers over the years and then design the beauty label. Wearified’s first 10 shades of bullet lipsticks convince us of this fact—they’re in a medium to deep skin tones, to perfectly complement Indians. “I have very dry lips and have always struggled with matte lipsticks. I didn’t enjoy spending 20 minutes on the lip balm-wait for 10 minutes-then apply lipstick routine on a daily basis! I wanted one that glides on easily, lasts all days and comes off easily too. My struggle of finding one that suits my lips led me to the current formula. It ensures that the application and removal of Wearified lipsticks are buttery soft! The pigment affords an effortless, one-stroke application for day-long wear,’ she explains. We’ve tried the lipsticks ourselves, and have to agree—Aanam’s hit the sweet spot with her formula. We also love that they’re enriched with jojoba, cocoa butter, argan oil and vitamin E.
Wearified’s campaign testifies the same ‘real girl energy’ as What When Wear. “There are zero filters and edits on our campaign shots! And we’ve represented people from all walks of life; we’ve featured everyone from a 22-year-old to a 59-year-old,” Aanam says enthusiastically. Her team members and mother are part of the campaign too. “There’s no modelling cast here—only real people,” she smiles.
Aanam’s clearly gone to town while naming the shades, drawing from personal stories and milestones. ‘26th Jan’ is named after the shade she concocted for her wedding, ‘Shabbo’ is a nod to what her mother’s fondly called, and LayTella, as you can probably guess, is a portmanteau of her favourite Lays and Nutella! 5ft3, Not Your Princess, and Monday (no surprise when to wear it) are a few other shades.
Giving us a couple of tricks to work with a deeper red, purple or maroon shades such as her BBRL or Gerry Berry, Aanam advises, “Start applying the bullet by filling the middle part of the lips, and then outline the lips. The minute you have over-applied and gone outside the lips, you can’t just wipe it; you have to clean the outline.” With masks being indispensable, she suggests, “After applying the lipstick, wait for a couple of mins for it to dry, and then wear your mask.”
A truly inclusive label at the core, Wearified is also vegan and free of cruelty, fragrance and toxins. It’s available on Wearified.in