Lakme Academy, powered by Aptech (LAPA), one of the leading beauty training institutes in India, has launched 'Winged' - India's first hair and makeup reality web series in collaboration with MTV India offering an exclusive platform to the hair and makeup aspirants across the country, to showcase their talent and win the title as India's first Hair and Makeup Superstar.
The winner of this title will be the brand ambassador of Lakme Academy for a year and will be groomed and trained to be a digital influencer.
Lakme Academy powered by Aptech, together with MTV India organised a pan India, college outreach program touching nearly 16500 plus beauty and makeup aspirants over a period of three months. Top 15 shortlisted candidates were trained by the experts at Lakme academy and the final shortlisting of 10 contenders were introduced to the stage of 'Winged'.
Lakme Academy collaborated with MTV to create an intellectual property called Winged. Winged is a weekly six web - episode series capturing the journey of above ten contestants battling it out to win the ultimate crown as India's first Hair and Makeup Superstar.
The first web episode aired on December 6, 2019, crossed eight hundred fifty thousand views followed by collectively 4.5 million views over the last five web episodes that have been aired so far.
Every web episode was uniquely challenged to explore different styles of makeup, including Bollywood divas, Indian brides belonging to different cultures, music genres, cos-play etc.
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There were eliminations after every episode and three out of the ten contenders have secured their place in the finale, and only one of them would earn the title as India's first 'Hair and Makeup Superstar'. The finale will be aired on Friday, January 10.
Lakme Academy, powered by Aptech presents Winged, powered by MTV
The host for the show is Gaelyn Mendonca and mentoring and guiding the contestants will be the judges - Pushkaraj Shenai, the CEO of Lakme Lever, Anupma Katiyal, National Creative Director at Lakme salon and model-actor and VJ, Sushant Divgikar who also represented India in Mr Gay World 2014. For episode second and third, actor Preetika Rao also mentored the contestants as a judge on the show.
"The Indian beauty market, which was valued at USD 6.5 billion in 2017, is expected to exceed USD 20 billion by 2025. This industry is seeing rapid strides and is highly employable. We are thrilled and very proud to be releasing our first reality web series - 'Winged' powered by MTV India," said Pravir Arora, Chief Marketing Officer, Aptech Ltd, while talking about the overwhelming response received for Winged.
"This is a six-episode show that challenges aspiring hair and makeup artists, grooms and evaluates them and takes them on the best professional journey they could ever dream of. The winner gets to be 'the brand ambassador of Lakme academy' for a year. This could change their life," added Arora.
"As a judge on Winged Series, I wanted the contestants to come out of their comfort zone, to make them go over-the-top with their craft if they had to and I could see that fire in them to be the best. Being an influencer and someone who puts on makeup every day, I had a great time mentoring the young beauty aspirants on Winged," said Sushant Divgikar, Indian model, performer, VJ and drag queen.
"The quality standard and expectations from the contestants were really high, and we loved to see how each of them took the effort to make their model look stunning and beautiful, tried to be innovative with the detailing and stayed positive despite the pressure," said Pushkaraj Shenai, CEO, Lakme Lever.
"This is the first time that a show like this has come up where aspiring hair and makeup artists are given the centre stage, otherwise these people, are always behind the scenes. We at Lakme Academy are happy to train these aspirants and excited to be a part of their journey. Winged as a platform would literally offer wings, accelerating their career ahead by a decade," said Anupma Katiyal, National Creative Director at Lakme salon.
Lakme Academy, powered by Aptech won the Global Education Awards 2019 for 'The Best Beauty and Wellness Training Institute of the Year'. Aptech Ltd was also awarded "Skill Learning Award - Beauty Training" by Franchise India in 2018.
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