Huda Beauty x Saint Levant Collab KALAMANTINA Celebrates Palestinian Culture
Huda Beauty and Saint Levant have joined forces on a new collaboration featuring a citrus twist and the sweet taste of summer nostalgia. After a week of orange-themed teasers, the highly-anticipated product was just revealed for pre-order: a new Faux Filler lip oil shade named KALAMANTINA, featuring a subtle clementine scent.
Leading up to the announcement, both Huda Kattan and Saint Levant teased the arrival of something big. This included Instagram clips showing the two dancing to Saint Levant’s song “KALAMANTINA” and the pair posing in front of a vintage car with clementines spilling out of the trunk. The two also posed holding oranges with fruit stickers reading “Grown by Huda n’ Saint Levant.”
A PARTNERSHIP BETWEEN POWERHOUSES
The collaboration was greeted with enthusiastic cheers — an unsurprising reaction, considering that both parties are powerhouses in their respective fields. Huda Beauty, founded by Iraqi-American entrepreneur Huda Kattan in 2013, has grown exponentially since it launched with its first product: Kattan’s bestselling fake eyelashes. Expanding from Kattan’s highly-successful blog of the same name, Huda Beauty is now a major makeup brand that, according to Forbes, is the top-selling cosmetics brand at Sephora in the Middle East.
Marwan Abdelhamid, known by his stage name Saint Levant, is no less incredible. Born in Jerusalem to an Algerian-French mother and a Serbian-Palestinian father, Saint Levant’s music (and his stage name) are a love letter to the Levantine. He first began making music in 2020, and specializes in Arab hip hop, R&B, and rock. At just 24 years old, the singer has successfully cultivated a dedicated following after releasing the TikTok viral hit “Very Few Friends.” His most recent album, Love Letters, features the song “KALAMANTINA,” a stylized play on the word “clementine.”
COLLABORATION WITH A CAUSE
Both Kattan and Saint Levant are significant Arab influencers, and, as seen through this collaboration, they do not take that responsibility lightly. Images on the KALAMANTINA web page herald it as a collab with a purpose. Huda Beauty promises that the brand will make a donation to “organizations supporting Palestinian agriculture and cultural preservation.” This promise is emphasized through Saint Levant prominently wearing a jeweled necklace in the shape of Palestine in the collaboration announcement.
While clementines themselves are not native to Palestine, oranges — specifically Jaffa oranges — are significant in Palestinian culture. The fruit was an important export for Palestinian farmers in the early 1900s. Alongside olives and watermelon, oranges are an important symbol of resilience and heritage to Palestinians. Oranges are also considered a symbol of Palestinians’ connection to the physical land, a concept that has developed through the image of the careful cultivation and care of trees that are rooted to the earth.
One thing is for sure, KALAMANTINA is a delicious new collab for a cause. Pre-order the Faux Filler lip oil in KALAMANTINA for 21.00 USD on Huda Beauty. Orders will be shipped July 31st.
Want to learn more about Palestinian culture? Check out EnVi’s first impressions of the film “To a Land Unknown” here.
