Dear Black Woman, You Are the Standard!

This week, we're chatting about how Black women have always been beautiful. But for centuries, the world tried to tell us otherwise. From our rich melanin to our coily crowns, our full lips, and our curvy bodies, we’ve had to fight for the right to see ourselves as beautiful and not by Eurocentric standards, but by our own definition of beauty.

But here’s the thing, We’ve never needed validation. Black beauty has always been bold, unapologetic, and undeniable. And over time, we’ve been reclaiming what was already ours.

Today, we’re taking a journey through the evolution of Black beauty, how we went from being excluded from beauty conversations to setting the trends that the world can’t get enough of.

The Early Years! Erased, But Never Forgotten

For generations, Black women were excluded from mainstream beauty standards. Our natural features, lips, hips and big butts. our hair, our rich melanin skin was either mocked, erased, or deemed “unprofessional.”

• Enslavement & Oppression During slavery and the Jim Crow era, Black beauty was degraded. Dark skin was seen as undesirable, and natural hair was often covered or straightened to fit into a world that rejected it.
• Colorism & The Paper Bag Test Lighter-skinned Black women were favored over darker-skinned women, reinforcing harmful divisions within our "own" community.
• Beauty Products That Weren’t Made for Us Early makeup and skincare brands ignored Black women completely. Foundation shades? One-size-fits-all. Hair products? Full of harmful chemicals to make our hair “acceptable.”

But even then, Black women still found ways to embrace their beauty. From homemade skincare using natural butters and oils to protective styles that kept our hair healthy, we took care of ourselves when the world refused to. Black beauty has always been bold, regal, and unapologetic. And through time, we’ve fought to reclaim what was already ours, our skin, our hair, our style, our culture. This blog is a celebration of that journey, a deep dive into how we went from being erased to being imitated, to finally standing in our own power and owning our beauty on our own terms.

The 1960s & 70s The Rise of Natural Beauty

This was the era where we said NO to Eurocentric beauty standards and YES to our own.

• The Black Power Movement brought back the Afro as a symbol of pride. It wasn’t just a hairstyle; it was a revolutionary statement that rejected the idea that we had to conform.
• Icons like Diana Ross, Pam Grier, and Angela Davis showed us that Black beauty wasn’t just powerful, it was glamorous, sexy, and stylish.
• Soul Train, Ebony, and Jet magazines started featuring darker-skinned women and natural hair, something that was rarely seen in mainstream media.

This was a turning point, we were no longer asking for a seat at the table. We were building our own!!

The 80s & 90s Supermodels, Hip-Hop Culture & The Rise of the Video Vixen

The 80s and 90s gave us more visibility in the beauty and fashion world. Black women were finally being recognized as the blueprint.

If we’ve learned anything over the years, it’s that Black women are the blueprint. Mainstream media may have ignored us for decades, but they could never deny our influence. In the 90s and early 2000s, hip-hop culture put Black beauty front and center, with artists like Lil’ Kim, Missy Elliott, and Destiny’s Child embracing bold fashion, vibrant hairstyles, and melanin-rich makeup that made a statement.

Over time, the world finally started to recognize what we had always known, Black beauty is powerful, marketable, and undeniable. Supermodels like Naomi Campbell, Tyra Banks, and Alek Wek broke barriers, walking runways that once shut Black women out. Beyoncé, Rihanna, and Lupita Nyong’o became global icons, setting beauty trends that the industry could no longer ignore. And then came one of the biggest shifts in beauty history, Fenty Beauty. When Rihanna launched her makeup line in 2017 with 40 foundation shades, she called out the industry’s neglect of darker-skinned women and forced every major brand to follow. The days of Black women being an afterthought were over.

• Supermodels like Naomi Campbell, Beverly Johnson, and Iman broke barriers, walking runways that once shut Black women out.
• Hip-Hop culture shifted beauty standards. Curves, brown skin, and full lips became trendy, though it wasn’t lost on us that the same features Black women were shamed for were suddenly "fashionable" when others had them.
• Black beauty brands started thriving. From M.A.C. introducing darker shades to Carol’s Daughter creating natural hair products, our needs were finally being met.

Even with this progress, Eurocentric beauty was still the dominant force. We were allowed in the room, but only if we fit the mold.

The 2000s & Beyond! The Natural Hair & Melanin Movements

Then came THE SHIFT.

One of the biggest revolutions in Black beauty history is the return to our natural hair. For decades, Black women were conditioned to believe that straight hair was the only “acceptable” hair. Schools, workplaces, and even some of our own family members reinforced the idea that wearing our natural curls, kinks, and coils made us look unprofessional or unkempt. Many of us were introduced to the hot comb at a young age, feeling the burn, both literally and figuratively, of trying to conform to a standard that was never meant for us.

In the early 1900s, relaxers and straightening products became popular as Black women sought acceptance in professional spaces. But the 1960s changed everything. The Black Power Movement introduced a bold and unapologetic embrace of our natural beauty, with the Afro becoming a symbol of pride, resistance, and self-love. Women like Angela Davis, Pam Grier, and Cicely Tyson stood tall with their natural crowns, showing the world that our beauty did not need to be altered to be powerful.

By the 90s and early 2000s, protective styles like box braids, locs, and bantu knots made a resurgence, proving that natural hair was not only beautiful but versatile. And then came the 2010s, where the natural hair movement truly took over. Black women began rejecting relaxers and embracing their natural textures in droves. Social media became a space for Black women to share their hair journeys, swapping tips, tutorials, and product recommendations. Major beauty brands were forced to take notice, and suddenly, natural hair products were no longer niche, they were mainstream. But the truth is, we never needed relaxers. Our hair was never the problem; the problem was the beauty industry that refused to accept it.

• The Natural Hair Movement exploded. We ditched the relaxers, embraced our curls, coils, and kinks, and normalized protective styles like braids, twists, and locs.
• Melanin Magic took over. Dark-skinned women were no longer being sidelined, we were the moment. From Lupita Nyong’o to Alek Wek, rich, deep skin tones became the gold standard.
• Social media gave us control. For the first time, we were defining our own beauty. No longer waiting for magazines to feature us, we were creating our own platforms, blogs, and movements to celebrate our beauty on our own terms.
• Fenty Beauty changed the game. When Rihanna launched 40 foundation shades in 2017, she called out the industry’s neglect of darker-skinned women and every brand had to follow.

Black beauty was no longer pushed to the side, it was setting the tone.

Today, Black Women ARE the Standard

We are the blueprint.

• Our hairstyles? Copied.
• Our full lips? Plumped.
• Our body shapes? Surgically replicated.
• Our fashion? Stolen, rebranded, and resold to us.

For years, we were told we weren’t enough, only for the world to turn around and profit off of the very things they mocked us for.

But here’s the difference now, we own our beauty.

We no longer need validation from anyone. We know that our skin glows in every shade, our hair is magic in every form, and our features are unmatched.

We are no longer chasing beauty standards. We ARE the standard.

Loving the Skin You’re In

If you take nothing else from this, take this, Black beauty is timeless. It is not something to be imitated, borrowed, or rebranded. It is a movement. It is a statement. It is power. You do not have to change a single thing about yourself to be beautiful because you already are. Your skin, your hair, your features, everything about you is worthy of love and celebration.

So, as we continue to evolve, let’s remember one thing: we set the trends, we own our beauty, and we do not need permission to shine. Black women are the standard. And we always have been.

Your melanin is a gift.

Your hair is art.
Your features are royalty.
Your beauty is undeniable.

So let’s continue to redefine beauty on our terms and never let anyone make us feel less than the queens we are.

Let’s Talk!

How have beauty standards affected you? What’s your journey been like with embracing your natural beauty? Drop a comment and let’s have this conversation!