Beauty influencer Achieng Agutu has had quite the year. Creating digital content for her over 800,000 followers, Agutu was featured in our March Issue, discussing beauty and confidence. Then, the Kenya-born creator was honored as Sports Illustrated 2024 Swim Rookie, celebrating her win on a trip to Cancun, Mexico. Named the “Confidence Queen,” thanks to her uplifting content, by Vogue, her tantalizing personality has landed her on a whole new media platform: reality television.
Premiering August 1, Agutu will hit off her talk show debut as a host for the new Amazon show Influenced. “I’m sitting, I’m taking it all in,” Agutu tells ESSENCE. The half-hour series is meant to bridge the gap between social media (influencers’ leading domain) and television, pulling them into a new outlet for influencing. “I want people, if they interact with me, my platform, to leave that space feeling 10,000 times better than they did when they walked in or when they saw it or watched it,” she says.
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Her and four other influencers, including Taryn Delanie and Cyrus Veyssi, will be the front runners for pop culture topics spanning beauty, fashion, entertainment and more. A full circle moment for Agutu, “I keep thinking of when I was in college, a lot of my friends asked me what I want to be, and I was like, ‘I think I want to be a TV presenter,’” she recalls. “At that point, I was really obsessed with politics, I was thinking, CNN. And [my friend] said, ‘Don’t you think that’s really big? Maybe you should think a little smaller.’”
Think smaller, she did not. After moving to the states in 2016, those like Ashley Graham inspired her path. “I would go into stores and see Sports Illustrated magazines,” she says. “I remember there was a magazine with Ashley Graham on it and it was revolutionary seeing a woman above a size four.” Now, she uses her platform to help others love every inch of their curves.
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And when she’s not gracing the runways and magazine pages, or filming a highly anticipated TV show, Agutu makes time for herself via self-care. This includes therapy. “I think it can be really easy for me to constantly give to the people around me and my community, whether that’s physical or digital, and not think of myself, she explains. “But I think going into therapy really lets me process a lot of the things that are happening in my life, but also have somebody else there who’s able to check in on me.”
Aside from this, she’s an avid “hot girl walker” and journaler. And to keep her skin glowing? “My skincare faves are the Daily Peels from Dr. Dennis Gross. It’s an amazing product. It will change your skin. I’m obsessed with it.” She follows that up with the Clarins Double Serum, the Estee Lauder Skin Tint Serum, and the MAC Lipglass.
No matter what, Agutu will continue to take every opportunity she can to represent others who look like her. “I want them to know that we deserve to be in these spaces,” she says. Out shopping after the Met Gala, a supporter confirmed her influence, telling her her content helped him through depression. “My purpose as a human moving throughout the world has been to really make people feel good about themselves.”
