Picture this: You're standing in a makeup store surrounded by products, but nothing is made for your skin tone. You've watched countless tutorials, but none of the techniques work for your eye shape. You've hired makeup artists for special events, only to look in the mirror and see someone who doesn't look like you staring back. For Sophie Auyeung, Founder of MYRRAR, this wasn't just an occasional frustration—it was her entire experience growing up. And when she started talking to other women about building an AI beauty advisor, the word that kept coming up wasn't "excited" or "impressed." It was "relief."

Sophie Auyeung brings a deeply personal perspective to beauty technology that extends far beyond product development. Growing up Asian in predominantly white areas, she experienced firsthand the psychological toll of beauty standards that excluded her features. Makeup artists either made her look "completely different" or "completely butchered" her makeup, leaving her with photos she couldn't bear to look at. This experience of blind experimentation and constant disappointment drove her to create MYRRAR (My Realistic, Reliable Augmented Reality)—an AI-powered beauty bestie that scans your unique facial features and recommends products specifically for you. In this episode of Lead with AI, Dr. Tamara Nall explores how MYRRAR is addressing a problem that runs far deeper than makeup recommendations, touching on representation, self-worth, and breaking cycles that have lasted generations.

 The Word That Changed Everything: Relief   

When Auyeung began conducting user testing for MYRRAR, she expected feedback about features, functionality, and user experience. What she received instead was something more visceral and emotional. Beta testers consistently described their experience with a single word that revealed the depth of the problem she was solving: relief. This response forced Auyeung to reconsider what MYRRAR really represented for women navigating a beauty industry that wasn't built with their features in mind.

The relief these women expressed wasn't about finding a convenient shopping tool or accessing product reviews. It represented freedom from a specific kind of anxiety that accompanies makeup shopping for women of color and those with features outside Euro centric beauty standards. This anxiety manifests in multiple ways throughout the beauty journey—standing in store aisles unsure which foundation shade might actually match, worrying whether expensive products will work on your skin texture, dreading the moment you look in the mirror after a professional makeup application, and hoping photos from important events turn out okay despite your uncertainty about your makeup choices.

Dr. Tamara Nall captured the significance of this response during the podcast conversation, noting that relief as the primary emotion indicates a level of underlying stress that most people don't associate with something as seemingly simple as makeup shopping. In a world already filled with genuine stressors, the fact that beauty routines add another layer of anxiety for millions of women represents a failure of the industry to serve its entire customer base. MYRRAR's ability to remove even one source of anxiety from women's lives, Nall observed, makes it far more than a beauty app—it becomes a tool for mental and emotional wellbeing.

 Understanding How Deep the Problem Really Runs   

Auyeung thought she understood beauty industry exclusion when she started building MYRRAR. She had lived the experience of products that didn't work for her skin, tutorials that didn't apply to her features, and beauty standards that excluded her face. However, the depth of the problem didn't fully crystallize until she began having conversations with potential users about their own experiences. The stories that emerged gave her chills and revealed that her personal frustration represented a small window into a much larger crisis of representation and self-worth.

Women shared experiences of never feeling beautiful in their own skin, of scrolling through social media and magazine spreads knowing that mainstream beauty culture had no space for their features. They described the psychological impact of growing up surrounded by Euro centric beauty archetypes that positioned their natural features as something to be corrected rather than celebrated. These weren't complaints about superficial preferences or trivial concerns; they were expressions of pain from women who had internalized the message that beauty standards weren't built for them and never would be.

The consistency of these experiences across different women, different ages, and different cultural backgrounds revealed a systemic problem within the beauty industry. Women of color waste significant money purchasing products that don't work for their complexions, not because they make poor choices but because the industry fails to provide adequate education and recommendations for diverse features. They endure makeup applications that make them look unrecognizable because many beauty professionals receive training focused primarily on features and techniques that don't transfer to all face types. They scroll past tutorial after tutorial knowing the advice doesn't apply to their eye shape, skin texture, or facial structure.

 Personalized AI That Acts Like Your Bestie   

The technical foundation of MYRRAR centers on sophisticated computer vision and machine learning systems that analyze individual facial features to generate personalized recommendations. Users can scan their faces to receive product and technique suggestions specifically suited to their unique characteristics, or they can scan products in stores to determine whether those items will work for their particular needs. This dual functionality addresses both the discovery challenge of finding appropriate products and the evaluation challenge of assessing whether specific items match individual requirements.

What distinguishes MYRRAR from generic beauty recommendation systems is its positioning as an AI bestie rather than simply an advisor or tool. The platform includes a messaging function where users can text with MYRRAR as they would with their closest friend, receiving guidance that balances expert beauty knowledge with the casual, supportive tone of friendship. This conversational approach acknowledges that beauty advice feels more trustworthy and actionable when it comes from someone who understands you personally rather than generic algorithms pushing popular products.

Perhaps the most innovative feature Auyeung revealed during the podcast is MYRRAR's adjustable sassiness setting. Users will be able to customize how directly MYRRAR communicates, from gentle suggestions to brutally honest feedback. This customization recognizes that different people want different types of advice—some users want encouragement and positive reinforcement, while others prefer friends who will tell them bluntly when something doesn't work. The ability to adjust this communication style makes MYRRAR adaptable to individual preferences in ways that human beauty advisors often struggle to achieve consistently.

Key features that make MYRRAR effective include:

• Facial Feature Scanning: Computer vision analysis of unique characteristics

• In-Store Product Evaluation: Scan items while shopping to determine compatibility

• Conversational AI Interface: Text-based interaction that feels like talking to your best friend

• Customizable Communication Style: Adjust sassiness levels from supportive to brutally honest

• Makeup-First Focus: Deep expertise in one category before expansion

• Inclusive Algorithm Training: Built specifically to serve underrepresented features

 Breaking the Generational Curse 

Auyeung's vision for MYRRAR extends far beyond solving immediate makeup shopping challenges. She articulates a mission to break generational curses of beauty insecurity that have affected countless young women who grew up feeling uncomfortable in their own skin. This language of generational curse acknowledges that beauty industry exclusion doesn't just affect individuals—it creates cycles that repeat across generations, with young girls learning early that beauty standards weren't built with them in mind.

The current state of beauty culture presents young girls with limited representation of diverse features. They scroll through social media seeing makeup content that excludes their face shape, eye structure, and skin characteristics. They watch beauty influencers who don't look like them demonstrating techniques that won't work for their features. They receive messages from mainstream media that position Euro centric features as the default standard of beauty while treating all other characteristics as variations requiring special accommodation or correction.

MYRRAR represents a step toward that shift by creating a safe space for women of color and underrepresented groups to explore makeup without the judgment, exclusion, or blind experimentation that characterized previous generations' experiences. By 2030, Auyeung envisions a future where young women can play with makeup confidently, knowing they have guidance specifically tailored to their features. This future eliminates the disappointment of purchasing products that don't work, the anxiety of trying techniques that fail, and the insecurity that comes from never seeing your features represented in beauty culture.

Joining the Movement  

For those interested in experiencing MYRRAR when it launches, Auyeung encourages a thoughtful exercise: consciously consider who you currently trust for beauty advice and why. In today's landscape, product recommendations flow from social media influencers, TikTok personalities, beauty industry marketing, and peer suggestions. Examining the sources of your current beauty guidance helps illuminate whether those sources genuinely understand your features or whether you're adapting general advice to your specific needs.

MYRRAR plans to launch sometime in 2026, making early engagement with the platform possible for those interested in being among the first users. The company maintains active social media presence on TikTok, Instagram, and LinkedIn under the handle MYRRAR, where interested consumers can follow development progress, learn about the technology, and potentially participate in beta testing opportunities as the launch approaches.

For more insights on how AI is transforming beauty and other consumer industries, subscribe to the Lead with AI podcast, where we explore the frontiers of artificial intelligence with the innovators who are shaping its development.

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LinkedIn: @TamaraNall | Website: TamaraNall.com | Email: Tamara@LeadwithAIPodcast.com

Follow Sophie:

LinkedIn: @Sophie-sin-yu-Auyeung

Follow MYRRAR:

Website: MYRRAR.com | LinkedIn: MYRRAR