- 6 days ago
A conversation about the importance of redefining traditional beauty standards to build a more inclusive industry and the art of being unafraid to define beauty on your own terms.
Category
🛠️
LifestyleTranscript
00:00Yes, hello, hello. How are we feeling? Essence Festival, 30th anniversary. Yes.
00:09Hello, my name is Akili King. I am the senior beauty editor at Essence magazine,
00:17and I am here with the incredible Kaiser Gondracek, WNBA star, beauty muse extraordinaire.
00:26We're going to get into a conversation about beauty inclusivity and changing the industry for the better.
00:32So I'm super excited to be with you today. How are you feeling? I'm good. Thank you for having me.
00:37I'm excited to be here. This is an amazing turnout. Absolutely. You look beautiful. Thank you. No surprise there.
00:44Yes. So before we get into some beauty questions, I would love for you to take us back to Younger U.
00:52Tell me about where your passion for basketball began.
00:56Yeah. So I grew up in a basketball heritage family. You know, my father's an NBA player.
01:02My mom won a national championship at Louisiana Tech. The family lineage of basketball, you know, goes on through my bloodstream and my bloodline.
01:12And so coming out the wound, it was kind of expected for me to play basketball.
01:16Luckily, I had the passion and the work ethic for it to take me to some amazing places in this world.
01:23It's paid for my education and for me to venture off onto the highest platform of women's basketball and make it to the WNBA.
01:32I'm truly grateful for what, you know, this game has given me. It's been a truly a gift and a blessing at the same time.
01:38That's so beautiful. I love to hear it. And where are you from again? Remind me.
01:43I was born and raised in Houston, Texas, and then I moved to Michigan.
01:47OK, amazing. OK. And then getting into beauty, like where did your passion for beauty and fashion begin?
01:54Was that something you were always interested in growing up?
01:56Yeah. So growing up, I was pretty much of a tomboy.
02:00You know, my father used to have us in the cornrows and the, you know, the headbands.
02:05But it wasn't until when I got to college and started paying attention to a little bit more of how I carried myself as I got into, you know, my young lady, you know, years.
02:18And it wasn't truly until probably maybe last year I didn't really start paying attention to fashion and rebranding myself.
02:28I think once when I hit 25 and I started getting into my womanhood, I noticed that I, my aura, my fashion,
02:36I wanted it to replicate where I was at in my life in terms of just how, you know, my wisdom, the place that God has me in, my level of maturity.
02:47And I feel like my fashion embodies exactly where I'm at in my life right now.
02:51I love it. I love it. And you have such a classic, timeless look in terms of both beauty and fashion.
02:59So it's, you know, incredible to hear that you sort of just started getting into it because it seems so natural to you.
03:05Off of that, I'm curious, who are some of your or who were some of your beauty inspirations growing up versus who are they right now?
03:13Yeah. So all of my inspirations growing up were all very basketball oriented.
03:18You know, you had Tina Thompson and, you know, Skylar Diggins at the time.
03:23She took me underneath her wing when I was in middle school.
03:26But once when, you know, because basketball has given me opportunities to be able to venture out into the fashion, you know, modeling industry,
03:34I got a chance to be around some of the high fashion models and saw the way that they carry themselves.
03:40And for me, always sweating and being an athlete, you know, my mom, she calls it the JLo bun.
03:46And so I'm always having my hair brushed back into a bun.
03:49And I really started to pay attention to the detail of my regimen and my skincare.
03:54I started doing Pilates, changed the frame of my body, knowing that there was a certain way that I wanted to look from a clean aesthetic.
04:03I think that my style truly resembles a 90s aura.
04:08And it's, you know, refreshing for me in my womanhood to understand that beauty comes from within and not from the exterior.
04:17I think we as women, sometimes we get so, you know, precedented into this false, you know, illusion of reality that never is real.
04:26You know, and as long as we keep chasing that illusion of beauty, we're always going to be altering ourselves.
04:32So to know that I can find it from within and to know that Kaiser was more than enough to begin with.
04:38I'm glad that I can truly embrace that in my womanhood now.
04:41That is beautiful. Couldn't agree more.
04:43And I love what you said about beauty stemming from the inside out.
04:47And you can find inspiration literally from yourself.
04:50So I love that.
04:51I want to circle more back to that later.
04:54But also I'm curious.
04:56I mean, we've all seen her gorgeous tunnel looks.
04:58So, so good.
05:01Where do you kind of draw your inspiration from when it comes to your approach to that both makeup and hair wise?
05:08And when you're going through the tunnel, like what are you kind of pulling from?
05:12Yeah, so I kind of go based off of the mood that I'm in.
05:15I am truly living in my blowout era.
05:18So like I like my hair big and full, the Farrah Fawcett look.
05:22And then I am have a fetish for leather jackets.
05:27I'm a suit girl.
05:28I love blazers.
05:29I love stockings.
05:31I'm learning how to implement dress shirts with blue jeans.
05:35You know, I've learned the beauty of less is more.
05:39And you don't have to overdo what God has already beautifully and wonderfully made.
05:44Absolutely.
05:45Yes.
05:46Amen to that.
05:47And yeah, I love what you said about being in your blowout era.
05:51Literally, I was talking to my sister this morning and she was like, Kaiser is inspiring me.
05:56Maybe I should reconsider and be a blowout baddie.
05:59I was like, I feel that.
06:01Yeah, no, I definitely transcended more into my natural era as I got into my womanhood, something
06:08that I haven't truly shared with the world yet, that everyone sees this rebrand of Kaiser,
06:14right?
06:15And like I said, it starts from the inside out.
06:17And so knowing that I was always enough, I, and I'm gonna be honest with my woman out
06:22here, you know, I took off the lashes.
06:25I took out the lip fillers.
06:26I took out the breast implants and I just went all back natural.
06:30And it just taught me and showed myself in a different light of knowing that I never had
06:36to continue to chase this illusion of beauty and that it comes from within.
06:40And as long as I see myself the way God sees me, everyone else's opinion truly doesn't matter.
06:45Exactly.
06:46Period.
06:47Wow.
06:48Incredible.
06:49And off of that, I'm curious to, you know, I feel like when people think of basketball
06:55or sports in general, they might not immediately associate that with beauty or self care or those
07:02kind of wellness things that we do to take care of ourselves.
07:05But I'm curious how or where you draw that confidence from to sort of push back on societal
07:11standards or, you know, pushing back on just not being placed into a box.
07:17Yeah, I would definitely say for me, my isolation period is where I kind of grew up.
07:23And I'm a firm believer, you know, God will put us on paths that we didn't even know that
07:27we traveled to take us right to where we've asked for the entire time.
07:31And so being able to spend that quality time with him and getting to learn myself through
07:36a different light kind of set the standard of my aura, how I want to carry myself and
07:41my company that I have around me.
07:43And I feel like now just being my most authentic self, I'm attracting everything it is that
07:48I want, deservingly so because of the gifts that God has given me, you know, that I covered
07:54up for so long and being able to transcend that into the basketball world.
07:59I feel like women's basketball in the WNBA is truly at the hottest time,
08:03especially with the rookie class that came in.
08:06You know, my teammate is Angel Reese and we are like two peas in a pod and, you know,
08:11and being able to have young women and ladies to embrace their femininity.
08:16Women's sports has come a long way, but I just think that it's a time for women in general right now.
08:22You know, I always say economically, you know, this world may have been made for men,
08:28but women, we make this thing go round, you know.
08:31I know that's right.
08:33Yes.
08:34Yeah, I love that.
08:35I feel like y'all are just an example of showing younger girls or just women of any age that
08:41we can do and be anything that we want to be, show up how we want to show up,
08:45and it doesn't matter as long as we're feeling, you know, our best.
08:49So I love that.
08:51And then I'm curious, what are some self-care lessons that you've learned from playing such an intense sport?
08:58You know, you're constantly on the road, you're traveling, going to appearances, et cetera.
09:04What are some lessons that you've learned on self-care through that?
09:07Yeah, well, luckily, you know, my mom, she always had me in the high bun and, you know,
09:13always taught me to keep my hair off my face.
09:16My skin care is a big thing for me because I've found the beauty in who I already am.
09:25I pay more attention to taking care of that aspect of me as well.
09:30I do a lot of, I'm old school with it.
09:34I wear Noxzema on my skin and my mom tells me to keep it in the refrigerator, you know.
09:40I went back to my roots.
09:42I do the Neutrogena acne pads and I put collagen from TJ Maxx on my skin and that's all I keep on my skin.
09:50And I keep my hair off my face.
09:51I keep makeup off my skin.
09:53You know, coming from a lineage of powerful black women, seeing that black don't crack.
10:00You know, I'm not living for this era.
10:02I'm living for longevity.
10:03Absolutely.
10:04Yes.
10:05And I love what you said about your mom.
10:07Yes.
10:08Clap it up.
10:09I love what you said about your mom.
10:11Because I feel like mothers know best because I always would push back against like wearing Cetaphil or using that on my skin.
10:19And now I'm like, actually, she was right.
10:21No, I didn't listen to my mom at all growing up.
10:24But now every phone call is like, Mom, what do I look like?
10:27What should I do?
10:28Yeah, she's my number one.
10:29I love that.
10:30I love that.
10:31Shout out to mom.
10:32And then, yeah, you mentioned Pilates.
10:35I'm curious, like, what other kind of wellness things you do to kind of decompress and in terms of self care.
10:43Yeah.
10:44So being an athlete, you know, off rip, I have to naturally, you know, keep myself in shape.
10:49But I think I've paid attention to my body just a little bit more and what I put in it.
10:54Realizing that there are vibrational foods that you put in that make yourself feel better.
11:00You know, and I've learned to, my body has learned to adapt to that.
11:04I drink a lot of water.
11:06I even sometimes put apple cider vinegar in my water.
11:10I eat a lot of green foods.
11:12I try to stay away from sweets because I have a sweet tooth.
11:17I'm really bad.
11:18Like, I'll eat a half a gallon of Blue Bell ice cream in one night.
11:21Like, I'm not playing.
11:23But I try to stay away from that as much as I can because I notice that it does have an effect on my mood.
11:29It has an effect on my skin.
11:31You know, I'll start breaking out.
11:32And I just think that once, you know, the best form of self-love is truly discipline.
11:38And if you can learn how to have accountability with yourself and learn how to be disciplined,
11:42you'll see it flourish in other areas of your life from the inside out.
11:46And I, you know, just paying attention to myself a little bit more has made all the difference, you know.
11:51And I feel like, yes, we were in this world to take care of others, but you have to take care of yourself first.
11:57Absolutely.
11:58The body is the temple.
12:00Yes.
12:01And then I'm curious, too, what advice would you give to maybe anyone who might be struggling to find their self-confidence and their inner belief in themselves?
12:14Yeah, I've struggled with my self-confidence for a very long time, especially just always being in the limelight.
12:22It was hard because I always felt like I needed to continue to alter myself to fit this false narrative of what Kaiser's supposed to look like.
12:30Right.
12:31But I think my greatest advice to give is to learn how to fall in love with yourself, learn how to be your own best friend.
12:39And once when you learn how to talk to yourself in a way, hear the sound of your own voice, hear the tone of God's voice,
12:47you know, you'll be able to attract anything and everything that you felt like you needed to alter to begin with.
12:53And I just hope that, you know, young women take a look at me and my platform and see that and can embrace my journey
13:01and know that no matter what, they can always unapologetically be themselves.
13:06Because as much as I tried to alter myself when I got to where I got to, I forgot that it was because I was me in the first place is the reason why I got there.
13:16Exactly. I love that.
13:18And off of that, on the note of pushing back on standards and what the current beauty standards are specifically,
13:26I'm curious what your personal definition of beauty is right now.
13:30Yeah, I say beauty is truly the essence of humanity. Duh, essence.
13:37But I think to be beautiful is to be proud of yourself.
13:42I've learned how to become proud of myself, flawed and all.
13:48You know, becoming my own best friend and looking at myself the way God sees me,
13:54I don't have this perception of perfection that just doesn't exist anymore.
13:59You know, which is why I can sit down and eat a half a gallon of Blue Bell ice cream if I want to.
14:03But with that being said, you know, seeing yourself in that light, I think that women were made to be beautiful.
14:10Women are powerful. You know, beauty does not just come through what you look like.
14:15It comes through your verbiage, it comes through your walk, it comes through your aura, it comes through your mind.
14:20You know, I've learned the definition of what it means to be sexy.
14:26You can walk into a room and be completely covered and be the sexiest woman up in there because of your aura.
14:32You know, and we were created to be that way.
14:35You know, and being able to stand proud and strong in that, you know, it may intimidate some people,
14:41but you learn how to embrace yourself and become the baddest woman, baddest black woman you can be.
14:47I love it. Yes. Oh, my God. You're amazing. Dropping gems, taking all the notes.
14:52Thank you. Amazing. And then when you're on the go, what would you say is like your go to beauty look in terms of makeup, hair, et cetera?
15:04Yeah, when I'm on the go, because I'm always traveling, I just normally just keep my hair in a bun,
15:09put on a leather jacket, some little baggy jeans and, you know, some some boots and just call it a day.
15:15You know, I I don't really try to overdo, you know, who I was already created to be.
15:20You know, at times like this, I can get all dressed up and get glammed and see myself in a different light.
15:27But I think that's one of the things I think as women that is we continue to learn about ourselves that we don't have to be made up all the time.
15:37And when you do decide to pop out, you know, it's people are like, wow, because they don't get to see you in that lens.
15:45And I think that the more that, you know, as I continue to step into my different platforms and how I carry myself,
15:52hopefully it can inspire women to be able to unapologetically do the same.
15:57Absolutely. Yes. And then I'm curious what people can expect next from you or what you're excited about that you're currently working on.
16:06Yeah, I'm in a really good place right now.
16:10Obviously, you know, things haven't gone out to the liking of my plans.
16:16But I always say if you want to make God laugh, you tell him your plans.
16:20I know him all too well to get discouraged, to know that I am literally taking steps into the direction of which he has orchestrated just for me,
16:31wherever that leads to, whether it's basketball, high fashion, acting, you know, being able to have these gifts to kind of do it all.
16:40But I think that's that's what's giving me peace right now.
16:43I get to wake up in the beauty of that discovery every day and be humbled and have grace in knowing that and also be excited for right where I'm at and where I will be.
16:54You know, I'm not in a rush.
16:56Anytime when I get in a rush, you can never no matter how hard I work, you can never outwork God.
17:01So I'm right where I'm supposed to be.
17:03Exactly.
17:04I love that.
17:05Beautiful.
17:06And I'm curious, you mentioned acting, maybe fashion.
17:11I mean, I have some stuff going on.
17:13I can't I can't put it out there yet, but I'm working on something.
17:16Amazing.
17:17What about in the beauty space?
17:18Anything there that?
17:19Yeah, I am.
17:20I aspire to cross over and to do high fashion modeling, obviously, with the type of attraction that I've got from my tunnel looks walking into my games.
17:30Some people are like, oh, you're you should be on a runway, you know.
17:33And so if God plants me and puts me in those rooms, I'm going to do it, you know, but I'm not going to force anything.
17:41You know, everything is about his timing and he's never a second late.
17:45Exactly.
17:46Well, you're incredible.
17:48Like all the gems today that have been dropped.
17:51You look amazing.
17:53Beautiful spirit inside and out.
17:55So just thank you so much for your time today.
17:57I appreciate it.
17:58Thank you so much.
17:59And thank you for everyone that took the time to listen.
18:01I appreciate it as well.
18:03Thank you all so much.
18:04Enjoy Essence Festival.
Comments