thinking but i definitely was thinking it was more of an experiment. you know, i had an idea to start a blog. actually, my sisters really pushed me especially my sister mona. she was like, you know, you need to be out there. you know so much about beauty. share it with the world. you re so passionate about it. and then, you know, one thing led to another, we started a beauty brand. and, no, never in my wildest dreams did i think we would be here ten years later. but i want to take you back to even before starting huda beauty, before becoming a make up artist even. so you were a child, you grew up in tennessee in the states, and your family had moved from iraq to the us. that s right. so, to a different cultural scene and to a place where not many people looked like you. yeah. what was life like? it was tough. i especially think at that time, i really struggled with my identity. i definitely struggled you know, i know it s we have a beauty brand now and we speak so
you dark things. i ve been speaking to some people in my community. you know, they re not influencers. they re people you know, theyjust have, like, a few followers and the amount of things they re dealing with are really tough. you know, the conversations i m having with them are really tough. and i know it s stemming from social media, you know? and that s what scares me. as an influencer, do you think you re empowering women just like you? maybe women who look like you, you re inspiring them? i hope so. um. i want to think i am, you know? i don t know if that s what i thought was going to happen in the very beginning, but as i started to get messages like, you re an inspiration, i started to say, oh, my god, like, this is actually something i have to do now. you know? sometimes you start something out of a hobby and then, you somehow end up finding a purpose with it. and then that s like, that s a great space to be in. like, you love it and then you have a purpose with it. th
i m huda beauty. sometimes, ifeel like huda ugly! yeah! you have this beautiful, sculpted, ultra glamorous look. guys, this feels so good. oh, my god! i m not mad at it at all. i think it s so pretty. huda kattan is one of the biggest names in beauty, with a business worth over $1 billion. we ask her what it means to be beautiful. join me, nouran sallam, for a special bbc 100 women conversation with huda kattan on bbc news. huda, welcome. thank you forjoining us. oh, i m so honoured to be here. thank you so much for having me. so, you re in paris right now to celebrate ten years since the launch of huda beauty. yeah. congratulations. thank you so much. it s surreal. did you think at the start that ten years on, you d be in this place? when we launched the brand, i don t know what i was
mum and she wears the hijab and leads a quite conservative life. yes, yeah. how do you balance your heritage with the need to self express in the same time? you know, it s hard sometimes because as a muslim woman and i love my faith so much for me, i didn t really grow up very religious. i became more spiritual as i became older and ifound that things from my religion just really calmed me. like prayer, to me, is one of the most beautiful experiences. and, you know, i started waking up for fajr earlier this year and it was one of the most amazing experiences i ve ever had and so, making sure that i do those things has been really good for me. but sometimes, i don t speak about it cos i m always afraid of the criticism. because i don t cover, because of these things, like people might say, oh, you re not allowed to do those things. so, sometimes it becomes hard. and my mom has always been somebody who s taught me, like, only god canjudge you and it s something it s a personal r