VIEW ALL PRODUCTS BY Wink Beauty
Wink Beauty combines the fun, funky packaging more commonly found in teen beauty lines with sophisticated wearable colors.
About the Founders
Wink Beauty was founded by Belen Aranda-Alvarado and Anna Lisa Raya in 2003, and began as an outlet for each women's unfailing passion for makeup and popular culture. They met as undergrads at Columbia University in 1992. While Anna had fearlessly carted her vintage makeup case to her dorm room (she did, after all, throw her first Mary Kay party when she was only 14 years old), Belen left her tackle box full of makeup at home, thinking that since she was in college she had to grow up and out of her fascination with eye shadow and lip gloss.
It wasn't until after they interned together in the beauty department at ELLE magazine – during which they spent countless hours playing and primping with products – that they both realized how lip lining, eyelash curling and brow bone highlighting were pleasure in life that should never be denied.
After college, Belen spend 5 years as the beauty editor at Latina magazine, an experience that led her to write “Latina Beauty: The Get Gorgeous Guide For Every Muje.” It was the first beauty book ever written specifically for the US Hispanic market and it was published by Hyperion in October 2000. In June 2002, Belen graduated from Business School with her M.B.A. Since then, she has dedicated herself to raising her daughter Natalia and building Wink Beauty into a fabulous fun and creative makeup company. She also continues to write for various publications such as the Washington Post and Allure Magazine.
Anna went on to get her M.S. from Columbia 's Graduated School of Journalism. After graduation, she worked at People magazine (where she helped launch the Scoop section) and followed that up with launching the LA based luxury lifestyle title, Angeleno. After a two year stint at Movieline, where she expanded that magazine's lifestyle editorial as the fashion editor, she finds herself at Variety, where she recently helped launch VLife, a consumer lifestyle and showbiz topics. Throughout the years, Anna has received hundreds of beauty product samples, all of which never really impressed and seemed to satisfy her own makeup needs. This is the impetus for her involvement in Wink Beauty.
Together, Anna and Belen have over 10 years of experiences in media, the beauty industry and business, as well as primary involvement in four start-up projects.
