Latinx Heritage Month is a time to celebrate Hispanic culture. In addition to commemorating Hispanic people, places, foods, etc.—it is also a moment to acknowledge the barriers we oppose and strive to break through. The beauty industry is one of the many areas where the Hispanic identity hasn’t always been accurately represented—especially from an Afro-Latin perspective.
Hispanics come in many different shapes, sizes, and colors. However, until recently, the beauty industry has predominantly marketed us from a singular point of view. Thankfully, through the power of social media, Afro-Latinas are breaking boundaries by creating a name for themselves. Through every beauty post we make, we represent young Afro-Latina girls and remind them they’re beautiful, too.
In the spirit of giving our Afro-Latina sisters time to shine, now during Latinx Heritage and beyond, we’ve sat down with several to learn more about how they continue to push forward. Below, learn more about, and give flowers to, these trailblazing beauties.
Denise Rodriguez
As a young girl, beauty and wellness content creator Denise Rodriguez would hang around her mother’s Dominican hair salon and admire the women around her. Her mother’s salon became pivotal in how Rodriguez viewed beauty moving forward. “Beauty has always looked like women in general, every part of us,” she tells ESSENCE. “My earliest memories are of all the beautiful women that surrounded me at that salon.”
These days, she follows the motto “less is more.” In other words, Rodriguez tries to embrace her natural features, her textured curls, wearing mascara with no extensions, and freckles. Rodriguez adds, “I’ve heard others reject and dislike their beauty marks, which breaks my heart because I genuinely feel those marks add to our uniqueness—which I believe is attached to our Purpose and our Light.” Her self-acceptance journey has helped her become an advocate for young Afro-Latina girls to do the same. Her words are a constant reminder that our features represent our ancestors.
Anayka Sheperd
TikTok’s beloved Anayka Sheperd is a beam of light within her community. She radiates confidence by sharing her thoughts on a wide range of topics online, in addition to her music. Growing up in Flatbush, Brooklyn, Sheperd was surrounded by an abundance of style and expression. She actively sought the exact artistic representation within her Panamanian culture, which she found more difficult. “I didn’t see many singers or actresses with very dark skin and big features,” she tells ESSENCE. “And if I did, they weren’t portrayed very positively.”
Sheperd eventually found inspiration from women like The Fresh Prince Of Bel Air’s Tatianna Ali. Knowing Ali’s background made Sheperd admire her further— deeply impacting how she wanted to show up in the world. “I made it my goal with my music and social media to show little girls that look like me and come from where I come from that we can be successful and celebrated,” says Sheperd. She honors this mission by showing up for the audience and continuously expressing Panamanian culture in her music and social media space.
“For me, redefining beauty as an Afro-Latina is blending my cultures seamlessly, without fear of judgment.” For example, “as a kid I would feel out of place because Panamanian jewelry is so different from American jewelry. Now I wear my Panamanian jewelry for every photoshoot, event and TikTok I do. It’s beautiful and I’m proud of it.”
Moving forward Sheperd hopes Afro-Latina girls continue to step into the world with pride. “Being Afro-Latina shows that Blackness shines in any culture and country. There is nothing anyone can say to you that will take away from the fact that you are still Afro-Latino. Sometimes people are so strict in who they consider to be “Hispanic or Latino.” She says, pushing back on this reality, “they want you to look and sound a certain way but you don’t have to be anything other than yourself.”
Brenda Smith
Brenda Smith, who represented Panama in the Miss Universe pageant, began her early beauty days with her grandmother. The two would get ready together before she went to school. Her grandmother’s passion for feeling good always made Smith feel like a true queen. However, as she continued to immerse herself in society, she didn’t feel accepted for her features.
“I often felt like I was a lot of things… and nothing all at once. I don’t have many early memories of feeling represented in the media or the beauty industry,” says Smith. She’d often watch telenovelas with her mother and didn’t see women who looked like her. The hunger for representation found her looking into magazines and other media outlets. Additionally, Smith recalls having difficulties finding her makeup shade in Hispanic countries and dealt with judgemental comments about her hair.
Smith continued to follow her love for beauty anyway. Her resilience eventually led her to win the Miss Mexico City pageant, which landed her a two-page spread in a national newspaper titled Belleza Afro, which means “Afro Beauty.” “It was national news that I was the first Black woman to hold that title,” she says. “I hope that, as time passes, we see fewer of these ‘firsts.’ But seeing that spread was an experience that healed my inner child.”
Astrict Flor Lorenzo
“Oh, I remember it so well!” Astrict Lorenzo expresses with excitement while recalling her first memory of beauty. With a recent campaign for LaRoche Posay, it’s natural to assume the model and actress’ journey has been easy. But that’s far from the truth.
“Growing up in Barrio Moscú,” a poor area of the Dominican Republic, “beauty seemed to be for the girls on TV,” she tells ESSENCE. In other words, “light skin, straight hair, and blonde Barbies,” says Lorenzo. She leaned into the beauty standard by relaxing her hair—something her mother didn’t want to do. “I felt like I’d finally made it—I was ‘pretty.’ Isn’t it wild how we sometimes think we must change ourselves to fit a beauty standard not even made for us?”
As more Afro-Latinos clap back against this label “Pelo malo,” or “bad hair,” we are beginning to see a change in how the Latinx community embraces their coils. Lorenzo is an excellent example of this. “I’m redefining beauty by living it! For me, beauty is freedom. It’s the freedom to embrace every part of me—my dark skin, afro hair, roots, and story. It wasn’t always this way.”
Marilyn Melo
Beauty and lifestyle content creator Marilyn Melo’s relationship with beauty stems from her family, as she recalls deeply admiring her mother and sisters. “It’s a powerful reflection of how beauty standards can be influenced by our close relationships rather than societal norms,” says Melo.
On the flip side, “I always felt disconnected when watching television programs like Telemundo and Univision. I never saw a novel in which an actress was dark unless she was a maid,” says Melo. Her experience resembles those of many other Afro-Latinas who didn’t feel represented accurately. These forms of expression create deep wounds in how we see ourselves. But healing begins as we continue to seek and see change.
“I make an important statement by putting myself out there as an Afro-Latina, showing young girls they can embrace their identity with pride. I couldn’t imagine someone like me in campaigns, in stores, on billboards, etc.,” she says. “I want to be that representation I never saw growing up. My pride in being part of the Black community highlights the diversity within Afro-Latinidad.”
