DUBAI: Barbadian pop legend Rihanna is asking for just two hours of your time to teach you how to do your make-up — Fenty style.
As the founder of Fenty Beauty, named by Time magazine as the Best Innovation of 2017, the 30-year-old singer and businesswoman heads to the UAE on Sept. 29 for her first masterclass in makeup, billed at $1,497 per session.
The venue for the one-day event has yet to be finalized, with tickets available for purchase from 2 p.m. on Thursday.
This is not Rihanna’s first venture into the Middle East — Fenty Beauty flooded Saudi Arabia with its products in April this year.
In the UAE, the event has been co-sponsored by Sephora. Proceeds from the event will go to Dubai Cares, a charitable organization that works with UN aid agencies and international NGOs in an effort to improve children’s access to education in developing countries.
For her part, uses the proceeds from Fenty Beauty beauty line towards charitable causes that benefit underprivileged girls across the world, especially in Africa and the Caribbean.
The star’s announcement comes fresh off the back of recent controversy surrounding her new eyeshadow palette “Moroccan Spice.”
In July, detractors accused her of cultural appropriation over a collection of 16 eyeshadow shades with names such as “Fez up,” “Desert baked” and “Shisha smoke.”
The palette’s desert-themed video featured models posing next to a camel with Arab-influenced music playing in the background.
However, some social media commenters slammed the campaign for not using Moroccan models. “Moroccan Spice with no Moroccan models to represent it. If Rihanna was white, her brand would be tarnished from the backlash she’d receive for this Orientalist nonsense,” a twitter user had said at the time.
Others took umbrage to the fact that the video was shot in the US, instead of Morocco.
Talking about the inclusive nature of her beauty products Rihanna had said that “Fenty Beauty was created for women of all shades, personalities, attitudes, cultures and race.
“I wanted everyone to feel included, that’s the real reason I made this line,” the singer, with a supposed net worth of $245 million, said.
The artist’s association with Saudi Arabia is not limited to her makeup line. She is reportedly dating billionaire Saudi businessman Hassan Jameel. The pair have yet to confirm their alleged romance, however.
