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Hipsters Only: Indie Beauty Brands
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items Welcome to my researched list of indie beauty brands! My aim is to highlight unique brands with cool products, run by amazing people, with heartfelt missions at their core. ♥
(Note: While I have done research on all of these brands, I have not personally tried them all. Please do your due diligence before purchasing.)
(Note: While I have done research on all of these brands, I have not personally tried them all. Please do your due diligence before purchasing.)
Sections
10
Alternative
Professional-Grade & Mid-Range to Affordable
Skin-Loving Formulas
Elevated Essentials
Green Beauty
Packaging Revolution
Alternative
Brands that are on the darker side of beauty. Witchy, gothic, ethereal, magical vibes. ♥
Clean, natural ingredients meet careful and meaningful alchemy to create makeup that wears like magic. This brand leans into magical vibes and is clean, vegan, and cruelty-free. They also offer free color consultations and accept returns of lightly u...
Rituel de Fille
This UK-based brand has a gothic/witchy aesthetic. Their wide range of products are highly pigmented, clean, vegan, and cruelty-free. Autistic- and female-owned. ♥
VE Cosmetics
A brand with a gothic and mystical aesthetic. Their high-quality cosmetics are handcrafted in small batches with rich colors and luxurious textures, and posted at affordable prices. They're clean, vegan, and cruelty-free. ♥
Notoriously Morbid
A German brand with a rebellious spirit and a focus on creating fiercely colorful, innovative makeup products. They aim to empower self-expression and self-discovery. They create high quality, professional-grade makeup and offer a magnetic packaging ...
Lethal Cosmetics
This brand has a unique aesthetic that leans whimsical, magical, and mysterious. They are best known for their vibrant, shifty eyeshadows and palettes (particularly their multichrome and flakie formulas). They also tend to collaborate with MUAs and o...
Dieverune Cosmetics
Sometimes called “gothic k-beauty”, this Korean brand has a dark, bold, dramatic, alternative approach to beauty. They create bold and unique color palettes and challenge conventional beauty norms by striving for a raw, unrefined, intentionally imper...
Risky Beauty
This dark, avant-garde brand is known for their gothic aesthetic. They create high-quality, long-lasting, pigmented products by hand and are especially praised for their matte lipsticks. They're vegan, cruelty-free, ethical, and socially responsible;...
Necromancy Cosmetica
Founded by Halsey, this brand is known for its bold, creative, and inclusive approach to beauty. They emphasize individuality and self-expression, while celebrating all skin tones, genders, and ethnicities. They actively work with diverse models, inf...
about-face beauty
Founded in 2010, this brand has been a trailblazer in unique, unapologetically cute makeup. They're known for vibrant, highly pigmented makeup, particularly eyeshadows and bold, unique colors. They are a cult favorite in the indie beauty scene, popul...
Sugarpill Cosmetics
This brand is known for its unique gothic-inspired makeup, particularly their highly pigmented liquid lipsticks and innovative eye products. They are recognized for their long-wearing, comfortable formulas, and their commitment to being vegan, cruelt...
Black Moon Cosmetics
This UK-based brand is known for its gothic and alternative makeup. They offer a range of products including eyeshadow palettes, lip products and more, with a focus on dark, moody, and shimmery shades. Additionally, they are known for their commitmen...
Jolie Beauty
This brand is known for its makeup line inspired by the supernatural and paranormal, with a focus on goth and vampire-inspired aesthetics. The brand, founded by Madam Curst (Mariel Pabst), a former ghost hunter, offers products like long-lasting liqu...
Curst Kosmetics
This brand prides itself on providing handcrafted products made with the finest natural ingredients. Their mission is to provide products that feel luxurious, look stunning, and reflect the values of sustainability and compassion. Vegan, cruelty-free...
Haunting Hues Cosmetics
This brand is known for its alternative, witchy, and gothic-themed makeup, particularly its "Funeral Proof" waterproof eyeliners and brow pomades. They also offer a range of other products like "Moon Water" liners and are recognized for their vegan, ...
HoloGrave Cosmetics
This brand releases on July 1, 2025.
They are “where makeup meets magick” and it looks like they plan to provide high-end lipsticks in bold colors. They “create for the women who dare to enchant the world, who practice beauty as rebellion and self-love as sacred.”
They are “where makeup meets magick” and it looks like they plan to provide high-end lipsticks in bold colors. They “create for the women who dare to enchant the world, who practice beauty as rebellion and self-love as sacred.”
Satanic Panic Cosmetics
Professional-Grade & Mid-Range to Affordable
High quality, professional-grade makeup at affordable prices. ♥
This brand creates a wide range of high quality, professional-grade products at affordable prices. They strive for innovative formulas and encourage creativity and inclusivity, while empowering people to enhance their natural beauty. Clean, vegan, an...
Moira Beauty
Founded by a MUA and content creator, this brand is known for its highly pigmented, unique eyeshadow palettes and blending brush sets. They also do collaborations with other makeup artists (like Robert Welsh) and are celebrity MUA approved and endors...
Blend Bunny Cosmetics
An Italian brand born with a commitment to be sincere to its customers. It's recognized for its innovative, high quality products and celebrated for its vegan and cruelty-free formulas. With a focus on creativity and artistry, they develop unique pro...
NABLA
High-quality products don't always mean high price tags. This brand creates a wide range of inclusive products that are generally comparable in quality to more expensive brands, but at affordable prices. They have a focus on diversity and self-expres...
Milani Cosmetics
This MUA- and influencer-founded brand is known for its high-quality, pigmented, blendable makeup. In particular, they are known for their eyeshadow and blush palettes. They emphasize inclusive and bold beauty with a focus on out-of-this-world and dr...
Lunar Beauty
This brand is known for producing high-quality, cruelty-free makeup, particularly eyeshadow palettes, at an affordable price point. They are also recognized for creating dupes of popular, higher-end eyeshadow palettes. 100% vegan and cruelty-free. ♥
Alter Ego
Skin-Loving Formulas
Brands that put skincare at the core of their formulations. ♥
The first and only brand to receive seals on all skincare products from the National Eczema Association, the National Rosacea Society, and the National Psoriasis Foundation. All formulas are created alongside board certified doctors that make up thei...
Tower 28 Beauty
This brand's high-performance products are clinically proven to offer skincare benefits both immediately and over time without compromising on the quality of the makeup. They're diverse and inclusive, and well-known for their lip products such as the...
Lawless Beauty
Founded by MUA Aimee Connolly, this brand specializes in multi-purpose, easy-to-use products that are cruelty-free and good for the skin. Their mission is to empower people to feel their best through minimal makeup routines. The brand creates product...
Sculpted By Aimee
Founded by Bobbi Brown, this brand is known for its “no-makeup makeup” philosophy. They focus on clean, high-grade, and easy-to-use products that enhance natural beauty. They emphasize simple, multi-purpose products, and are designed to be hydrating ...
Jones Road Beauty
Founded by an aunt-niece duo, this brand is known for its clean, vegan, and cruelty-free lip glosses that focus on hydrating and nourishing the lips while also being kind to the planet. They emphasize sustainability through recyclable packaging and s...
ButterSky Beauty
Elevated Essentials
Beauty essentials that go above and beyond with their elevated performance and skin-loving ingredients. ♥
This brand is mostly known for their lip products and skin-loving formulations. They're clean, vegan, cruelty-free, and focused on sustainable production. The black lip balm is a cult-favorite, sometimes considered an alternative for Clinique's Black...
Finding Ferdinand
Founded by YouTuber Angelica Nyqvist, this brand has become known for its soft, synthetic makeup brushes, high quality and beautiful eyeshadow palettes, as well as their buttery and blendable blushes. They are clean, vegan, cruelty-free, and they str...
Singe Beauty
Inspired by “unfussy French style,” this brand aims to deliver elevated essentials for skin that's lived a little. With clean, vegan, cruelty-free products, they aim to provide hydrating and lightweight formulas that provide a second-skin finish and ...
Maxine's Revenge
This brand stands out for emphasizing the need to embrace individual beauty and unique features. With a focus on natural ingredients, their formulations are clean, vegan, and cruelty-free. Their products are of professional quality, their packaging i...
Polite Society
This influencer-founded brand is clean, vegan, cruelty-free, and known for their effective skincare and hybrid makeup products, with a focus on ease and simplicity in beauty routines. They're well-known for their Jet Lag Mask and Lip Butter Balms, wh...
Summer Fridays
This MUA-founded indie brand is known for its long-lasting, high-covering makeup designed for all skin types and shades. They use skin-friendly ingredients in their formulations, ensuring they're hypoallergenic and non-comedogenic. Their signature pr...
Frankie Rose Cosmetics
This UK woman-owned brand is best known for its range of over 130 water-activated (wet) liners. They're also recognized for their bold, colorful, and high-pigment products. To top it off, they're vegan and cruelty-free. ♥
Glisten Cosmetics
This brand is known for its handmade, vegan, and cruelty-free makeup products, particularly eyeshadows. They offer a wide range of fun and exciting makeup, including eyeshadows, lip products, nail polishes, and more. The brand is also recognized for ...
Copacetic Cosmetics
Inspired by a mother's love for her son (and all things glittery), this brand is known for its unique and creative beauty products, particularly its multichrome eyeshadows and loose pigments. They are also recognized for their vegan-friendly, biodegr...
Kaima Cosmetics
Green Beauty
Brands that go above & beyond in their commitments to sustainability & our planet. ♥
A Swedish makeup brand that centers around sustainability. They use natural, wild-harvested ingredients and focus on minimizing their environmental impact through slow, small-scale production and biodegradable formulas. Their products are multi-use, ...
Manasi 7
This brand's focus is on clean, sustainable, vegan, and cruelty-free formulas. They prioritize creating high-performing and environmentally conscious products. To do this, they use refillable and recyclable packaging. They also prioritize MUA-approve...
MOB Beauty
This is another brand with high-performance, clean formulations. Their products are designed to create a natural, dewy glow, and are made with safe, effective, and sustainable ingredients. They have award-winning products, sustainable practices, and ...
Saie Beauty
Packaging Revolution
Brands that are changing the game when it comes to packaging, whether for sustainability or accessibility. ♥
This brand is known for their zero-waste, refillable makeup that often has two products in one convenient package. They also provide essential makeup kits, which bundle a full face of makeup products into a portable bag for purchase. Their formulatio...
trestique
Skincare That Slays
The essential foundation of beauty. ♥
Clean, effective formulas with high concentrations of active ingredients are what this brand is all about. They focus on anti-aging, brightening, and hydrating products at affordable price points. They're vegan (with the exception of their timeless e...
Timeless Skin Care
This Australian brand is known for its range of innovative, vegan, cruelty-free sunscreen and skincare products. They specifically focus on SPF 50+ protection, as well as sunscreens that can be worn over makeup without causing a white cast or pilling...
NAKED SUNDAYS
This brand is known for its innovative use of lobster-derived marine glycoproteins in its skincare products, particularly its Soothing Hydration Cream. These glycoproteins, derived from lobster processing byproducts, are believed to hydrate and repai...
Marin Skincare
This Asian-owned business is a personal care brand known for its "Beauty Beyond the Binary" philosophy. Founded by David Yi, Good Light focuses on gender-inclusive skincare products that are formulated to be clean, vegan, and cruelty-free. ♥
good light
This shop is known for being an environmental and climate-conscious beauty brand that creates products formulated in Italy. The brand emphasizes a holistic approach, aiming to nourish not just the skin but the whole self. They are known for their Moo...
ieró Beauty
This female-owned indie brand is a skincare brand specializing in luxury scrubs and clean skincare rituals. They offer oils, serums, lotions, and body scrubs in signature scents. ♥
Bare by Amanda
This brand is transforming the world of well-being with science-based, 100% natural products for sensitive skin. They offer both skincare and haircare. ♥
Butter Be Kind
Queen of Tools
Elevate your makeup game with high quality brushes & tools. ♥
This Brazilian brand specializes in its high-quality, innovative makeup brushes and tools. They also offer a range of makeup products that lean more toward the natural nude ranges (with some pops of color from their collabs). Everything they make is ...
Sigma Beauty
This UK-based brand began as a shop offering unique, handmade makeup brushes filled with glitter. They've since grown to also include makeup, glitter, bags, and other accessories. Vegan and cruelty-free. ♥
Cosmic Brushes
POC-Owned
Brands owned by POC with commitments to inclusivity & diversity. ♥
A celebration of South Asian beauty and culture, this brand is known for its fun, colorful, vibrant products and its focus on inclusive beauty standards. Their unique clean, cruelty-free formulations are uniquely designed to complement South Asian sk...
Kulfi Beauty
This Indigenous-owned brand was founded by an Anishinaabe woman and aims to create a space where Indigenous people feel represented and seen in the beauty industry. They create clean, cruelty-free, and sustainable cosmetics in an array of bright colo...
Cheekbone Beauty
This Latina-owned brand prides themselves on being handmade, vegan, and cruelty-free. They offer unique and high-quality eyeshadows, particularly multichromes and pressed pigments. They're recognized for their innovative color stories inspired by spa...
Terra Moons Cosmetics
Founded by an Asian husband-and-wife duo, this brand is known for its high-quality eyeshadow palettes, particularly for their blendable mattes and unique, shimmering shades. The brand is also recognized for its magnetic palettes, vegan options, and h...
Adept Cosmetics
This brand was created by Basma Hameed, a burn survivor that wanted to create makeup that looked good on real skin. The brand is focused on having an inclusive approach to its products, creating makeup designed with diverse skin tones and textures in...
BASMA Beauty
This Black-owned indie brand offers handmade products with in-house formulations that are always vegan and cruelty-free. They strive to be unique, offer unique color stories made with luxury ingredients, and empower women of all skin tones to be conf...
Klarity Kosmetics
Unique Aesthetic
Brands centered around a totally unique/niche aesthetic. ♥
This brand is known for its unique, animal-themed eyeshadow palettes, liquid lipsticks, and glitter toppers. They are particularly recognized for their high-quality, talc-free, and cruelty-free formulas. The brand also emphasizes unique color stories...
Menagerie Cosmetics
This brand is known for its makeup collections inspired by video games. They create products with vibrant colors and packaging that evoke the aesthetics and themes of popular games. Their products often feature unique color stories and designs based ...
Game Beauty
This brand is known for its innovative, high-performance color cosmetics, particularly their Stroboscope Hyper-Flash Powder and multi-use pigments. They are also recognized for their unique color creations, often inspired by celestial and mystical th...
Moonplay Cosmetics