Sun Daze Los Angeles is an online brand founded by SJHHS’ very own Renee Knight. It designs, creates and sells both makeup and clothing, taking inspiration from the vintage aesthetic.

“Shane Dawson, and how he got his inspiration off of Jeffree Star was really cool. I had all these creative ideas and I had the perfect vision of how I wanted things, and his whole journey really inspired me,” said Knight.

With this inspiration, she cultivated her business from her bedroom, starting with her eyeshadow palette and lip gloss.

 “I wanted to mainly do palettes, because I knew that no one did their own handmade palettes. I did some research, and there were some things on the internet. I used ingredients that different websites told me to, and came up with the perfect formula that I liked,”  said Knight. “There were precautions set up with being clean, and I wore a full gown. It was basically like what you wear going into surgery.”

Knight made fifty palettes in her first drop, all of which sold out in the first two hours. She made over two thousand dollars from those fifty palettes, however not all of this was profit due to mistakes she ran into along the way with legal applications. 

“It was really fast. I have always wanted to start a business, and I had ideas for my brand for over a year. I posted a little video of my palette, which I didn’t think was going to get any attention. All of a sudden, everyone wanted it, and it became a big thing,” said Knight. “I really wish if I were to go back, I would have taken more time to plan everything out,” said Knight. 

The fast paced nature of her business kept her workload very heavy all the time, something Knight learned to cope with. 

“I would get home, and wouldn’t really make time for homework, which sounds bad. It was a conflict between school and business, but I was able to manage both. It was really hard, ” said Knight. 

Knight would stay up all night making orders in her bedroom, however the intense workload she believes has paid off. “For people that have kind of a big following on social media, the best thing about it is inspiring people. I used to get DM’s saying how much I’ve inspired them. That stuff really means a lot to me.”

Currently, Knight is taking more time to focus on herself, and is taking a break from the majority of her social media. She is working on her clothing line for Sun Daze, focusing on mainly developing graphics for her consumers in the future.