This year, MadameNoire and HelloBeautiful have teamed up for the grand return of iOne Digital’s Melanin Awards. The goal: Celebrate and amplify the best Black-owned beauty brands with honest reviews from our editorial staff. We’ve spent the last few months diving deep into the realm of foundations, serums, bundles and more, and have emerged all the better for it.
Now, we welcome you to immerse yourself into our beautyverse where you’ll have the opportunity to explore and shop all the winning products of the 2022 Melanin Awards.
Along the journey, be sure to check out our stunning HelloBeautiful digital cover, featuring multi-hyphenate superstar La La Anthony. Her hair brand, Inala, is replete with the Triple Threat Tonic, a scentless formula that immediately hydrates and smooths tresses. It’s a must-have and this year’s Newbie award winner.
We hope you enjoy this experience as much as we enjoyed creating it for you.
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La La Anthony made her foray into haircare with her brand Inala in 2022. Launched with her Power Potion – a product that harnesses the strengthening and growing power of real rice water complex, biotin, and arginine in a scentless formula. As we celebrate La La with our “Newbie Award,” we had the pleasure of testing her recently released third product – a 3-in-1 Triple Threat Tonic. This tonic acts as a primer, styler, and refresher for your hair in between washes.
The Triple Threat Tonic instantly adds moisture to your hair, instantly leaving your curls or waves softer and shinier. If you’ve ever created your own rice water treatment at home, you can attest to the pungent aroma. The Triple Threat Tonic ($27) packs the same great benefits without the awful smell. It’s especially sensitive to those sensitive scents. Combined with the Power Potion ($55) and Reset Rinse ($30), this lethal combo will fortify your hair for optimal retention and growth.
“I started seeing a huge difference in my hair from rice water,” says La La about the product. “But I noticed after a certain number of hours it smells really bad. So I kept thinking how can I make this into something that people can use on a regular basis and see these same kinds of amazing results that I’m seeing from fermenting rice on my own in my kitchen? And that’s how Inala started.”
Mayvenn makes mastering wigs and bundles easy. The popular hair distributer offers a variety of bundles, closures, and wigs in various textures, lengths, and styles. Their diversity in hair, durability, long wear, thickness and budget-friendly prices make them a top retailer in the hair industry.
What makes their Peruvian Body Wave Bundles so good? They’re made from remy hair, which means all their cuticles face one direction to prevent tangling. The bundles arrived in individual satin baggies. The bundles had a soft and pleasant scent. The hair maintains its texture without chemicals thanks to the steamed process that locks in the wave. Their thick tight double machine wefts help prevent shedding for long-lasting wearability and easy installation. The thickness and sturdiness made it easy for the needle to maneuver each track, creating a fast and seamless finishing style.
The hair maintained a natural sheen, and healthy volume, and produced little to no shedding before and after washing and conditioning. The hair remained soft, held a curl and was easy to manage. With one pass of the flat iron, the hair straightened with ease for a natural blowed-out texture.
Alwayz Pretti’s Camp Out Marshmallow Root Extreme Conditioner is high in plant proteins and is formulated to nourish and thicken the hair. Consistent usage allows a person to experience silkier, smoother, and healthier tresses.
Coating the hair from root to tip after shampooing allows the plant proteins to penetrate the strand, strengthening and hydrating each follicle. The formula rejuvenates hair by restoring the mane’s natural oils while protecting it from the wear and tear of everyday styling and product usage.
For optimal results, apply the Camp Out conditioner after each wash, put on a plastic cap, and sit under a dryer or steamer for approximately 20 minutes. Rinse the hair and style it as usual. Consistent usage is suggested to see continued growth and hydration. You can purchase Alwayz Pretti’s Camp Out Root Extreme Conditioner for $10.
Wash day just got easier! Tracee Ellis Ross’ PATTERN Mini Shower Brush and Wide Tooth Comb is a match made in hair heaven. The mini brush is compact and perfect for traveling from an overnight sleepover with the girls to a weekend getaway with your significant other. Best used on wet tresses, the detangling brush glides through the hair with ease leaving your hair untangled. Apply your favorite shampoo and/or conditioner and let the bristles work their way from the ends of your curls to the roots of your scalp. The gentle bristles help define your curls. With an affordable price tag of $9, this product is a steal that’s easy on your pockets and, more importantly, your mane.
The sister to the shower brush — the sturdy Wide Tooth Comb is quality at its finest. The space between the teeth ensures that the detangling process is as painless as possible. Best used on wet or dry hair, this comb knocked off thirty minutes to my typical two-hour haircare wash regimen. Part the hair in sections and let the teeth glide through your strands with your favorite leave-in conditioner. At a price tag of $15, it is indeed worth the coins. You will instantly notice the results that both the Mini Shower Brush and Wide Tooth Comb offer. Your tresses will thank you as you walk the streets rocking defined, gorgeous curls.
Finding the right leave-in conditioner for your hair is a process. It’s why when we stumble across a product that works well for various hair types, we hold it dear. Such is the case for this year’s winner for best leave-in conditioner: Briogeo Farewell Frizz. It’s a clean, gluten-free product that uses its unique blend of ingredients to target hair woes.
In a single bottle you’ll find rosehip oil packed with essential fatty acids, argan oil with vitamin E, and coconut oil that locks in moisture and fights breakage. The harmony of these oils is undeniable as they get to work taming frizz (for hours upon hours might we add) and shining dull tresses. It also has a light and fresh scent that almost doubles as a perfume. Consider it your new signature scent.
We’ve been most pleased with the results after applying to clean, damp hair. But you want to be sure to thoroughly work the product through the strands before allowing it to dry. Feel free to style per usual afterwards.
The Briogeo Farewell Frizz is definitely the product you want to throw in your purse on those potentially bad hair days. It gets straight to work and allows you to look like your best self.
If you’re looking for a new holy grail product for your tresses, look no further than Mielle’s Rosemary Mint Scalp & Hair Strengthening Oil. The moment this formula touches your scalp, you know you’ve arrived somewhere worthwhile. Parched strands don’t stand a chance as the oil makes its way from the root down to the ends; leaving no follicle unmoisturized.
It boasts a mix of over 30 essential oils and nutrients, including soothing mint, rosemary and long-time fan favorite, biotin. Together, these ingredients form a superpower that bolsters weak tresses and improves length retention. But for optimal results, you’ll have to follow a simple routine.
If you’re using it as a scalp treatment, start by sectioning the hair so that the scalp is exposed. Then, apply a small amount to the scalp and massage in with fingers before combing through. Leave it as is and style as usual.
When using to address split ends, apply the oil to the end of strands, place under a processing cap for 10 minutes, rinse and shampoo. We love that it is an effective product that doesn’t come close to breaking the bank. At $9.99 it’s easy on your pockets and hair.
Word of wisdom: keep a bottle of Mielle’s Rosemary Mint Scalp & Hair strengthening oil closeby if you want to keep your hair in tip-top shape. Split ends? Don’t know her.
For all the loyal lace front mommies, and the girlies looking to lose their wig-wearing virginity, we implore you to link up with Glamher Studios-Made Pretty. This duo has two independent beauty businesses but come together for one goal, and that’s the greater good of creating wigs to perfection. Glamher provided its top tier Passion Wave bundles and Made Pretty hand-crafted the unit using a swiss lace frontal; there’s also an HD lace option for those who want an elevated seamlessness.
The Passion Wave wig reviewed by MADAMENOIRE is styled with a middle part and falls about 16 inches. It’s not too long and not too short. It offers just enough flexibility to control and manage a big hair look. And if you’re feeling extra, there’s more than enough to wear falling past your shoulders and whip your hair back and forth. The price point for this glam unit comes in at $350. That price is give or take depending on length. The luxury is well worth the spend. Maintenance for the wig involves normal washing and conditioning. The unit lasts up to three years. To extend the life of the unit, replacing the frontal closure regularly helps. A silk storage bag arrives with the purchase of the wig, however, investing in a wig head holds the shape.
XOXO Virgin Hair tape-ins are what’s up in the hair extension game for Black girls. Though they aren’t novel, the innovation of the tape-in has the weave game in a clutch. It puts older methods of weaving to shame. Take for instance certain quick weaves. One technique involves molding the hair down with goobs of hair gel; swathing the head with a stocking cap; sealing the hair dry with high heat; then gluing the hair wefts around the head till completion. No shade to the process but–Issa lot. And if you’re a city girl on the go, ya might not be on that kinda time. XOXO tape-ins change the game.
On average, install time is under two hours. The XOXO raw virgin straight hair used in this review is evenly distributed across each tape-in strip. A reasonable amount of your own hair strands is carefully enmeshed between a pair of tape-ins. This technique yields an undetectable protective finish that looks natural AF–so much so, they might say it’s photoshopped. The brand is behind some of the trendiest looks in entertainment.
There’s no deficit of edge control products in the hair care industry. The surge in edge control brands is in sync with the re-emerging trend of styling natural baby hairs, and the swooped edges you see laid along the perimeter of lace front wigs to create a seamless hairline.
Dreamgirls Hold & Grow Edge Control gives new meaning to snatched edges. This dreamy product gathers those fine hairs and tough-to-manage strands and leaves that hairline smoothed to the gods. Though the consistency feels light and weightless, there’s no need to be heavy handed with this edge slayer. A little goes a long way. Dreamgirls glides slick over dry hair without caking up or leaving heavy residue. With damp hair, it gels nicely for optimum molding and a polished finish. —And it takes lasting power to new heights without flaking. Where other brands fall short, Dreamgirls edge control rises. Most holding products, particularly gels and pomades have a tendency to zap moisture, causing the hair to become brittle with the potential for breakage. Dreamgirls, obviously, had this in mind when concocting its edge control. The ingredients consist of AnaGain, Amla and castor oil which helps hydrate hairs while providing hold—that alone makes it a brand to patronize.
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All products have been independently selected by our editors. Please note: we may receive an affiliate commission for products and services purchased through our website.
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