By Naomi Marshall
Setra Oselmo and Falana Rogers are big names in Guyana’s makeup industry and have leveraged their popularity to foster women empowerment through their new cosmetic line, ‘Majesty Collection’.
The Majesty Collection includes an eye shadow palette with 15 pigments signifying royalty. The new line also features six intense shades of matte lipsticks, five different styles of ‘100% mink’ lashes and three shades of highly pigmented highlighters.
According to Rogers, the Majesty Collection is not just another make up line, but the products are of excellent quality and budget-friendly.
She added that the cosmetic line also represents “sister hood, women empowerment, women of all races, hard working mothers, strong women in society, women crowning each other, women in business, and it also honours great women who have passed on and never got to fulfil their dreams.”
Twenty-six-year-old Rogers is an internationally trained makeup artist who was born in Linden Guyana but was raised in Trinidad and is currently base in the USA.
She obtained her first cosmetic certificate at age 17 from Sacha Cosmetics in Trinidad, after which she worked as a makeup consultant at Pennywise Cosmetics.
In 2016 she was also able to complete professional makeup training with one of Trinidad’s well known celebrity makeup artists, Dion Samuel.
This motivated the young woman to move to Guyana and open her first makeup studio in Linden June 2017. This venture was challenging for Rogers since she was not well known at the time and had little to no clients.
However, she definitely did not allow the challenges to stop her from progressing. Later that year she migrated to the USA and had her first child in 2018 which motivated her to keep pushing.
With the thought of how difficult it was to find affordable, great quality makeup in Guyana, she launched her very own makeup line later 2018, Falana Cosmetics and would have distributors based in Guyana, of which Setra Oselmo was one
Her first product was the Luminous eyeshadow palette, and then she was able to add more products such as eyelashes, lip-glosses, lipsticks, glitters and additional eyeshadow palettes.
Over time, the mother of one came up with the idea of collaborating with local artists from Guyana in order to give them the recognition they deserve.
“I’ve gotten the chance to meet a lot of talented people while in this industry and they are not recognized enough for what they can do so by collaborating with some of them will help get them out there in a positive way,” Rogers told Village Voice GY.
Thus far, Rogers has collaborated with nail technician commonly known as ‘Ebony Creative Hand’; makeup artists, Decarla Hodge, Red Parris and the latest collaboration with Setra Oselmo.
Oselmo is an award-winning cosmetologist and fashion designer, who grew up in Nottinghamshire, Upper Demerara-Berbice, but currently lives in Linden.
At age 20, Oselmo was involved in a vehicular accident which left her permanently paralysed. Although she is reliant on a wheelchair to get around, she certainly does not allow it to keep her down.
In 2010, three years after the accident, Oselmo successfully completed a cosmetology programme and began her ever evolving career as a makeup artist and fashion-designer.
Asked what does makeup mean to you, the 33-year-old- said, makeup is what actually saved her life.
“Make up goes very deep for me, it is what actually saves me because I was on the verge of, or literally attempted suicide and I did not even realize that was what I was doing because I was in such a depressive state so after that I looked at myself in the mirror and was like, what are you doing? You are so beautiful and have so much to offer society,” she recalled.
Oselmo told Village Voice, “I was taught to go natural and not wear makeup but I always had a little stash and it literally made me feel great again and that is how I ended up getting involved in cosmetology and I found that I liked make up more as time went by and the whole feel of when women look at themselves when I’m done with their makeup. They seem so happy and confident. All I know is that makeup saved me and a lot of my clients too.”
According to Oselmo, planning for the makeup line began in April 2020 and was not an easy process since perfection was the goal. She also disclosed that the makeup line was initially scheduled to be launched on November 26, 2020 but her sister passed away on November 24, which caused a delay in the launch.
The Majesty Collection was launched March 4, 2021 and is dedicated to Oselmo’s late sister, Sisi Oselmo who also played a significant role in the planning of the cosmetic line.
