A collection of AORA México productsAORANo matter if you’re shopping real or virtual shelves, it’s tough for brands at Sephora to differentiate from all the competition. But AORA México boasts not one but two one-of-a-kind factors: They are the only completely plastic-free beauty brand at the retailer, plus their packaging is in English and Spanish. “Everyone has French; we chose to have English and Spanish, the second most spoken language in this country,” says Nour Tayara, CEO and co-founder of AORA. It’s a fitting choice for a brand born in Mexico City.As for being plastic-free, it’s one of the reasons Tayara wanted to start a beauty brand in the first place. Tayara started his career as an engineer then switched tracks and worked for a major beauty conglomerate for many years, so he saw firsthand the toll the beauty industry is taking on the planet. “It’s an extremely high percentage of products that are not recyclable, so we wanted to do something about that, and that's why we created AORA,” he says. “It's time for something new from somewhere else; we are a colorful force of change.”The aesthetics of AORA are just as important as its values. “We knew clean beauty was growing, but was becoming very beige, very ‘my skin but better,’” Tayara says. “If you want clean beauty and a silver eyeshadow, or a darker lip gloss, or overlined Latina lips, why does it have to be so subdued? You don't have to be beige organic everything. We are humans of multiplicities.”A model applying the AORA Acaríciame Más Spicy Plumping Chili-Infused Solid Lip Gloss SerumAORAWhen AORA initially launched four years ago, Tayara wanted the brand to embody his love of color and its Mexican heritage. “I am obsessed with color,” he says. “I think color is a great, great way to bring people joy, and I have a deep, deep, deep love for Mexico, a country that has adopted me. My co-founder is Mexican. We both love everything about Mexico. We started AORA with a big mission, and coming out of the frustration of seeing the world of premium luxury makeup very focused on brands ending with Paris, London or New York. There are beautiful voices of artistry, of color, of imaginations, of creativity that deserve a seat at the table, and more than that, should be seen. There is beauty from all over.”That philosophy is reflected in the brand’s name. AORA is a play on “ahora,” the Spanish word for “now.” Tayara removed the “h” simply because it looked better as a logo. “The now comes from so many different things,” he says. “It's now time for Mexico. The now comes as well from the feeling of presence that we have in Mexican culture, enjoying the moment, and the now comes from in a world of every big beauty conglomerate and company saying we will reduce our plastic footprint or move to PCR plastic by the year 2030. We are saying that we are reducing absolutely everything by 100% now.”AORA CEO and co-founder Nour TayaraAORAAORA integrates its Mexican heritage into all it does, from the messaging to ingredients. “Everything about the brand, the visual orientation, is actually a conclusion of centuries of Mexican creativity,” Tayara says. “It is about Mexican art, architecture, archeology. It is about neon archeology, which is our Mírame Eyeshadow Palette. When you open the palette, you don’t know if it's an archeologist that has unearthed an ancient pyramid or are we unveiling a futuristic object? The box of the palette, the blue on the outside is the Frida Azul and the pink is rosa Mexicano. This gold of the pyramid is not any gold. That is the same gold as a fresh piece of 10 pesos, because I wanted to choose the gold that is the most in circulation in Mexico. It is the gold of the coin that is used by every single person of over 100 million inhabitants. How can the palette look so old and so futuristic at the same time? What a beautiful feeling to achieve that. And that is Mexico.”Many of the product names are in Spanish, like the Acaríciame Más Spicy Plumping Chili-Infused Solid Lip Gloss Serum that is formulated with a blend of five Mexican chilis to trigger circulation for fuller, plumper lips. Then there’s the leather Chili Bag Charm & Lip Serum On-the-Go Carrier, which is handmade by local artisans in León, a city in the central Mexican state of Guanajuato that’s known for leather goods, and they are paid a fair wage. “The chili charm is a great example of everything we do,” Tayara says. “The brand is designed in Mexico, and that says a lot. You can make products with intention, paying proper wages to people who know who they are, not at the other end of the world in a crazy factory, and people will buy it. Everything doesn't have to be a free gift with purchase. Mexico goes into absolutely everything, so we take this mission with a lot of pride and responsibility.”The AORA Mírame Eyeshadow PaletteAORAAORA tries to keep everything as local as possible, going beyond Mexico’s borders only when necessary. “We are in a global world where we cannot promise to manufacture everything in Mexico because life doesn’t work that way,” Tayara says. “There are specific manufacturers for things, but we wanted to make sure that we have designed with extreme intentionality in Mexico. That starts with our packaging.” Even the ingredients are a celebration of Mexico, as they are sourced from the country, culture and folklore. The Inicia Antipollution Primer has a cactus flower extract called tepezcohuite, a local plant known for its healing properties. “Burn victims in Mexico use these ancestral tepezcohuite creams,” Tayara says. “I can’t claim that we can do that, but we're preparing clinical studies for the future.” In the primer it soothes and reduces redness. “It's an anti-pollution primer because we know pollution. Mexico City is the contender for the number one most polluted city in the world every year, so that's a very Mexican product.”Inicia also happens to be Tayara’s personal favorite. “That product is just a miracle,” he says. “You can use it with your moisturizer, under your moisturizer, as a highlighter. Sometimes I put it on my collarbones, sometimes I put it on my hands. You don't even need a mirror. The numbers are showing it—it's sold out already three times. It is a lovely product that is setting new standards in the industry.”A collection of AORA México productsAORA To ensure every AORA product is fully recyclable, they are committed to monomaterials. “Our intention was less about making plastic the demon and more about most plastic products are not recyclable,” Tayara says. “We are plastic-free so that we can be recyclable. We wanted to stick to known and established streams of recycling.” That’s why their packaging is made from aluminum, tin and wood. Even the mirror inside the palette is tin, not glass, to make it easy to toss in a recycling bin. “Everything has been polished, made with very specific technologies, so that palette, at the end of the day, used to be a can of soup and will be again.”For the beauty industry to become more sustainable, Tayara believes companies should pave the way. “There is too much responsibility on the consumer, and the responsibility is on me, not on the consumer,” he says. “You're buying a pleasure product. It's up to me to make sure that you don't spend your life in the guilt that we have put on consumers who think that global warming is their responsibility. It is not. There are governments and there are manufacturers. Governments might not save us, but I strongly believe that brands and capitalism will.”The AORA Spicy Rojo Lip DuoAORA What’s inside the packaging is made with just as much sustainability efforts. All the formulas are clean and their palette is talc-free. Since efficacy comes first, AORA uses synthetic ingredients when it’s better for the product and the planet. “I wouldn’t say we strive to have natural ingredients,” Tayara says. “I strongly believe in performance, ethics and traceability. We are extremely traceable with our ingredients and manufacturing. It is important in a makeup brand to have mica that is ethically sourced, which is the case with our mica, and to have palm oil that is not linked to deforestation. That for me is super important, much more than saying I have an organic ingredient.” Tayara hopes that by being the first plastic-free brand at Sephora, AORA will set a new standard in the industry. “We had the craziest dream to launch a brand from Mexico, which is not a beauty hub at all,” he says. “We created everything from scratch, saying that the future can be plastic-free, but almost not talking about being sustainable and getting people to come into the brand because they find us cool or sexy or fun or amazing as a product, and that's how it should be. We are proof that you can make it happen. We're sending people to other planets—we can figure out how to make your lipstick without plastic or make that plastic recyclable. The point is to keep inspiring the industry, to keep pushing boundaries. Everyone is not going to become plastic-free, but it's a conversation that is being had. That conversation will bring a lot of incremental innovation in the right direction everywhere and voila.”