Before India Bradley stands en pointe to frame herself steadily to achieve a classic pirouette, or even prior to her wrapping on her ballet shoe, the Detroit-raised dancer places self-care at the top of her list of daily priorities. “The biggest misconception about ballerinas is how people think the beauty they see is all effortless,” NYC Ballet’s India Bradley straightens out. “The discipline, repetition, long hours, and body aches that happen before we even get to the stage are the things that actually make it so beautiful.”
The art form is near and dear to Bradley, who has the physical endurance of ballet within her genes. Her mother is a dance teacher who shared the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater stage with a troupe during her career.
“Prioritizing self-care becomes more and more imperative to how I prepare for my ballet performances, especially with age,” the dancer says with transparency. “What ballet dancers do on a daily basis is already so unnatural to the body, and as you get older, the body needs more time to recover and heal.”
Only with lifelong training can a dancer perform as unshakably fluid as India Bradley does when she takes on the stage. Bradley has to be conscious of her every move, and pre-and-post-show routines are what prepare her body to conquer a seasonal run of shows. “My post-show beauty routine starts before I even exit the theatre,” India Bradley shares. “Consisting of double, sometimes triple cleansing my face. Stage makeup sticks to the skin!” Then, “hopping in the dressing room shower, straight upstairs to the cold plunge, and home to eat dinner!”
Her 2023 role as Dewdrop in George Balanchine’s The Nutcracker shed light on Bradley’s effervescent capabilities to dance playfully with the utmost form and grace. Oftentimes, she fights against gravity with fouettés and effortless-in-appearance framings of the human anatomy to mirror perfection, she is what strong ballet dancers train for and strive for daily during their entire professions.
Outside of a stretch routine suitable for an Olympic gymnast, India Bradley maintains consistency in her self-care habits. She always has her skincare tools: face wash, toner, Vitamin C, moisturizer, recharge gel cream, and SPF in her self-care lineup. Whether it’s her Fenty Beauty Skin Fat Water or her INNBEAUTY Project Extreme Cream Eye, Bradley maximizes her facial care with highly effective products. “Maintaining a beauty routine in the midst of intense ballet training can be difficult,” she admits.
Her preferred beauty regimen includes a Fenty Beauty Countour Skinstick, First Aid Beauty Facial Radiance Pads, and INNBEAUTY Project’s Recharge Gel Cream to bring out vitality within her skin after a strenuous day of dancing. “Making sure everything in my routine is highly effective helps me feel like it’s not all a waste of time.” But, according to dancers in her company and friends, “everyone who knows me knows that my pre-show ritual is a good nap. It reenergizes me, keeps me calm, and clears my head before a show!”
The newly announced 2025 soloist of NYC Ballet and history-making performer, Bradley, is accustomed to breaking molds, navigating through elite ballet spaces that are a global fixture in the world of European arts, majorly excluding talented Black artists. India Bradley is the first soloist Black dancer within the institution’s 75-year history. The INNBEAUTY Project’s latest campaign features India Bradley and praises her for being the ultimate in high performance. “When INNBEAUTY presented this concept of spotlighting ballet as the ‘ultimate in high performance,” Bradley states. “I was immediately on board because what looks easy on stage is anything but.
Ballet and beauty have a mutual understanding that dwells on a sensitive intersection where discipline and form meet—with campy costumes, dramatic makeup, immersive stage production, and pure mechanical human tenacity; ballet performance is as much of a theatrical experience as it is a superhuman sport of sheer resilience. Bradley has an airiness about her—an impenetrable light source that maintains positivity through strife. “In my experience I feel like I have been seen as only Black first, then maybe beautiful, and then maybe human,” India Bradley addresses. “I think beauty is transforming across ballet in a way where beauty is becoming synonymous with humanity instead of whiteness.”
