By Contributor,Craig Barritt,Jasmine Browley
Copyright forbes
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – SEPTEMBER 12: (L-R) Maude Okrah Hunter, Iman and Sam Fine attend the BBR Black Beauty Excellence Luncheon at Virgin Hotels New York City on September 12, 2025 in New York City. (Photo by Craig Barritt/Getty Images for Black Beauty Roster)
Getty Images for Black Beauty Roster
At New York Fashion Week, the intention for many was unmistakable: less spectacle, more substance. As budgets tighten and public backlash against DEI chills some brand activity, millennial founders in fashion and beauty doubled down on purpose, proximity, and partnership—centering community over clout.
For Gina Lewis, founder of Freetown (styled “FRTWN”), NYFW and beyond was an extension of a lifelong project that weaves scholarship, commerce, and cultural memory.
“It is named in reference and in reverence to Freetown, Sierra Leone,” she tells me, noting the brand’s goal is to spark curiosity about the African diaspora through clothing and experiences. A former global merchant and buyer with a master’s in African American Studies from UCLA, Lewis describes her path as a fusion of practice and research shaped early by family. “This is a lifelong journey… For me, it was my grandmother’s relationship to clothing, who often would make my Easter dresses and school clothes and Halloween costumes,” she shares smilingly.
Gina Lewis, founder of FRTWN
Brandon Hicks
That same throughline powered one of FRTWN’s most resonant moments: a self-funded, private community experience around the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s “Superfine” exhibition curated by Dr. Monica L. Miller.
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“We really wanted to hold space for people to get to experience that together and in community,” Lewis explains to me. Pulling it off meant absorbing the costs and planning over several months. When asked why she chose to back it herself, she framed the decision as brand strategy, not charity: investing in culture-first touchpoints is how FRTWN communicates its values and grows its community—online and IRL.
Staying nimble, Lewis added, is a feature, not a bug of millennial entrepreneurship in 2025’s climate. “We’re a small business, and so, yeah, the thinking small, acting small, being nimble, like, that’s what we do.” Her advice for founders plotting their next move is equally unflashy and rigorous: “Curiosity, patience, discipline. Those are the three pillars.” Purpose, she emphasized, is the ballast: anchor in it, refine the craft, and allow the vision to evolve.
If FRTWN’s playbook centered curation and study-in-public, Maude Okrah Hunter’s Black Beauty Roster (BBR) embodied coalition-building. BBR’s Black Excellence Luncheon—an annual anchor at NYFW—was designed to be a joy-forward corrective to a season defined by tough headlines.
“In amongst all the chaos around the attacks on inclusion,” she said, “beauty is inclusion, if you think about it,” she tells me. “We realize that we’re big consumers of beauty, and therefore, the focus around the value that we bring needs to be championed. And if the industry won’t champion it, we will champion it.”
Okrah Hunter points to long-term partners who have leaned in, not out, as the climate has shifted. Ulta returned to support the luncheon and education initiatives, while SalonCentric and Oribe—partners since BBR’s first digital summit in 2021—continue backing hands-on training to ensure artists can work across all textures and complexions. The impact is practical and immediate. At BBR activations, she said, hairstylists and creators regularly meet brands and “from there have gone on to do deals that have been keying hair shows, keying on set editorial shoots, and to be able to have brand collaborations.”
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – SEPTEMBER 12: Jenee Naylor attends the BBR Black Beauty Excellence Luncheon at Virgin Hotels New York City on September 12, 2025 in New York City. (Photo by Craig Barritt/Getty Images for Black Beauty Roster)
Getty Images for Black Beauty Roster
And because creator economics are inseparable from fashion-week optics, BBR is pushing beyond celebration to skill-building and pay equity. The organization will host a Creator Summit on November 7 in Los Angeles focused on closing income gaps. As Okrah Hunter put it, “Black and Brown creators make about 35% less than their counterparts. So, how do we leverage education, resources and networking to be able to close that gap and do it in an elevated way that brings community together?”
Both founders acknowledge that opportunities look different than they did even a year ago. Budgets are tighter, selection pressures are real, and “mainstream” attention can be fickle. Yet what might sound like constriction has yielded sharper collaboration. Okrah Hunter cites a recent partnership with Harlem’s Fashion Row in which BBR supported hair and makeup for Black designers backstage: “It was a blackity Black moment, but a beautiful moment to show the power… when we work together.”
The net effect at NYFW: a recalibration away from singular “moments” toward durable ecosystems where talent meets resources and story meets sales. Lewis is clear on what that looks like on the style side—values you can see. She’s inspired by professionals who “self express and self embody and can storytell through their clothing,” whether via heirloom dressing, vintage, or buying from women-owned and Black-owned brands. In her words, it’s “the embodiment of wearing your values kind of on your sleeve.”
And for Okrah Hunter, the near-term goal is as emotional as it is economic: “creating an environment and energy where we see more yeses and that you are worthy… ensuring that we’re filling everyone’s cup and that they leave there overjoyed.”
In a season short on easy wins, millennial founders like Lewis and Okrah Hunter modeled a different scoreboard: community retention, skills transfer, and cultural literacy. The takeaway for peers navigating the same headwinds? Keep your tent close, your collaborators closer—and your purpose closest of all.
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