A glimpse at 3INA’s social media platforms and campaign images, and you’ll promptly learn that this London-based beauty brand is all for self-expression. Known for its disruptive, rule-breaking approach to beauty, 3INA is home to bold, punchy colours and inclusive shade ranges tagged with pocket-friendly prices – attributes that are inherently embedded in its DNA.
What you probably didn’t know is that the brand was founded by Pablo Rivera and Mark Eve, who’ve both built their reputation in the world of fast fashion before boarding the beauty boat. And for men who knew zilch about makeup upon making that huge shift, we’d say these fast learners have done a solid job at serving up a slew of on-trend pieces for all beauty enthusiasts. Needless to say, we’ll be clamouring for monthly product launches and exclusive seasonal treats from this cruelty-free and paraben-free label.
We sat down with the boys (young at heart, they insist) and got down to the nitty-gritty on all things beauty.
NYLON: 3INA’s flagship store in Covent Garden is incredible. What are some of the bestsellers in London right now?
PABLO: The Highlighter is doing extremely well, all over the world actually, which is kind of rare for a beauty brand. The whole Longwear Lipstick line – 503 is the bestseller – but the whole range is actually doing extremely well. It has a very long-lasting formula and it doesn’t dry the lips out. Our Pen Eyeliner too, of course, and The Cream Eyeshadow. Our Cream Eyeshadow is very unique, the texture is amazing.
MARK: You can’t get it off your face once you’ve got it on.
PABLO: We want products with good formulas, high pigmentation, and long-lasting effect. This is what we stand for.
N: What makes 3INA stand out in a sea of coloured cosmetics?
M: It’s our disruptive price point, I think. Just to explain a little bit on what makes a product special: It is all down to its ingredients, and we source the best possible ingredients that you can find on our planet, basically. We bring those ingredients to Europe where we come up with these terrific formulas that will compete against the best brands on the market, but at drugstore prices. With our prices, you won’t have any service proposition, you’ll be there amongst typical brands like L’Oreal, Maybelline, Revlon… So the experience is very different if you look at our price category for the product that you’re getting. Also, the variety – we’ve got over 600 products in the store – and what you’re able to do with 3INA is explore colour without compromising on formula. So maybe you’d want to explore a purple mascara, you should try it…
N: I’ve tried the pink one and I love it.
M: For you to pick a pink mascara over your common black mascara is quite an investment. So typically you would try to find one that’s cheaper – typically won’t last very long, you won’t get the payoff and pigmentation as Pablo mentioned. But with 3INA you can get very high quality and explore more with colour.
P: What makes 3INA 3INA is the formulas, the playfulness, and our approach to beauty. We believe that we are very disruptive versus all other brands that have a very traditional approach to beauty. We are much more real in that sense. We’re very flexible – we can pick up a trend and put it in stores within 3 or 4 months depending on which product it is. So we work very fast compared to the rest of the industry. So I would say that these things are what make us different from the other brands.
M: Also, we bring out product every month. So there’s 2 types of launches: one is a product launch, a range of different colours; and then you have our collections, so the collections are limited edition, so the thing we’re stressing is that when it’s limited, it’s limited. So if you don’t get it at the launch, you probably won’t get it. If you wanna be the one amongst your friends that has it, come down and get it at the store. If not, we’re not bringing them back in, so come and pick up that product before it’s gone.
N: If you had to pick a favourite from the collection, which product would it be and why?
P: I use The Micellar Water every day, but if I have to choose one… It’s in the Top 10 and it’s totally unexpected, it’s The Matte & Smooth Primer. We have an amazing face primer which, again, is something we’re very proud of because it’s not an obvious one for coloured makeup brand. It’s one of those products that shows the quality we have because it’s not easy to have a primer make the Top 10 list, like The Highlighter. So yeah, it’s my favourite because of what it means, what it implies.
M: Mine is The Fixing Spray. It’s taken us completely by surprise. First of all, the smell – it’s quite a unique smell to us and those who have bought it have become pretty addicted to the smell. You can use it as a base, or if you’re halfway through the day, with the climate that you’re in, just a couple of sprays will reset your makeup, so there’s no need for touchups during the day. So yeah, if you just want a bit of a refresh from the air-conditioning you’re exposed to every day, take it out, do a couple of spritzes and you’ll feel much lighter.
N: Which items do you think would perform really well in the Singaporean market?
M: Yeah, I think The Fixing Spray is gonna be popular here. The Longwear Lipstick, definitely. You can kiss as many guys as you want, all day long, it will still be there – no matter what you eat.
P: 70 shades of lipsticks. 3INA is about colour and playing with makeup, about exploring and having fun, so that’s why we have such a variety.
M: We have a very wide range of foundations, 5 different types of finishes. We’ve got mascaras with 5 different formulas. And in case you’re a swimmer, we have a little tip for you. Often what people do is they’ll use a waterproof mascara, but it doesn’t give you the effect you’re looking for. So if you take any one of your favourite mascaras, and then you take our Waterproof Definition Mascara – it’s clear – you can then apply this over the top. So you can have definition or achieve the cakey look or whichever look appeals most to you. If it’s raining outside, don’t worry about it running down your face, just use our clear Waterproof Mascara and you’re set. And The Cream Eyeshadow. It won’t run, you can go and swim in it… We have people in Greece that used it throughout summer, and they were coming out of the ocean and still it was perfect.
N: How would you define the 3INA girl?
P: I would say she’s a person of today. We are gender agnostic and age agnostic…
M: Yeah, I think it’s somebody who’s pretty confident in themselves. So, if 3INA had a voice, she would say, “I knew who I wanted to be and that’s who I am.” If you live by that motto, if you’re not afraid to be you, and if you wanna live youthful. We don’t care what age you are, what race you are, what gender you are. Yeah, even for our age – I know he’s considerably older than I am – we live life like we’re 22 or 23-year-olds.
P: We feel like we’re closer to reality than most brands are. A lot of these brands have this sense of perfection that is far away from what is actually happening today in the world amongst the younger population. So this is why 3INA was born – to bring this honest approach to beauty. We feel we are very close to the customer.
M: We keep referencing girls but obviously guys as well. When you’re in a group of friends in today’s modern world, it means that your friends are of different ethnic background, and if you look at a friend and say, “I love your blush. Where did you get it from?” Often, the brand doesn’t service all skin tones, so you can’t exchange tips or products because the brand doesn’t cater to various skin tones. With 3INA, we’ve always tried to make sure that the product carries across all skin tones, so you should be able to share tips with any one of your friends. If you wanna send a gift to your friend in Ghana or in Mexico, you can be sure that our product will work well with any skin tone.
P: We have stores in Australia, we’re opening in Moscow in 2 weeks, we have stores in South Africa, in Belarus… The diversity is part of what we are.
N: Speaking of diversity, you touched on the topic of gender earlier. Will you be featuring more boys in your future campaigns?
M: We’ve had Patrick Dooley – he’s a model who’s based in London. He was in our Valentine’s campaign and our brow campaign, so yeah.
P: He’s a part of 3INA.
N: What is the brand working on at the moment? Can we get a sneak peek of what’s to come?
M: Oh, we’re working on so many things. We’re very excited about the Christmas collection – it’s quite different. It’s pretty special, and it has a very special formula.
P: It’s gonna be holographic, and the effects are amazing – how they change and the texture. It will be launched next month.
M: It is a super interesting product because it changes from a powder into a cream, so it’s more the experience you get with the product as well the effect. We’re working on products out in July at the moment, so we’re constantly watching what’s on trend right now, and what people are talking about on social media. We’re heavily influenced by colour from the catwalks, and we’re very close to culture, what is it that the Gen Z and Gen Y are talking about, so maybe it’s the IKEA blue bag that’s the inspiration of the next blue lipstick. As Pablo mentioned earlier, a real sense of what’s going on in the world.
N: Are there any specific individuals who have inspired your products?
M: I think it’s more of what happened in the ’80s and ’90s, so we do reflect a lot on past decades, and we love the early generation of Benetton, of ESPRIT, the Uniqlo movement – so all these colour moments. We really hope that 3INA is that next colour moment that’s connecting culture and colour, but in beauty.
P: Also we are not just about London, New York, or San Francisco – we are global. We are already present in 11 countries today, so we take inspiration from global trends.
M: And we travel. We travel a lot. We’ve travelled for many years – Pablo obviously a lot longer than me, as you can see. [Laughs]
P: He wants to make his point! [Laughs] But he also said it’s about the spirit, and I’m younger in spirit than he is.
M: So yeah, we get feedback from everywhere. You can be on a trip and see a particular item, or it might be a piece of art, or it might be something that you’re wearing… I mean I really like your nails, I think that’s a very clever little technique so you might be seeing that in a campaign soon.
N: 😱
M: So it’s things like these that we pick up on and share it with the team. We have an amazing team around us so we’re very lucky.
P: That’s what makes 3INA unique. It’s the team, it’s the people.
3INA, available at #01-27, Tampines Mall; and #B2-67, ION Orchard Linkway. 3ina.com.
Header image: @3ina
