Makeup lover bringing bespoke lipstick shop to Overland Park with glossy girl-to-girl gamble

Viktoria Volosin came home from a girls’ trip to Dallas with a business idea she couldn’t shake after discovering a shop where customers could make their own lipstick and lip gloss — an offering she hadn’t seen in Johnson County.

Viktoria Volosin with models in a promotional image for Bespoke Beaute Lab; courtesy photo

“There was just such good girl-to-girl conversation,” said Volosin, a self-proclaimed “huge makeup lover” who was most struck by seeing groups of women sitting around talking while they experimented with different colors. “It was really uplifting.”

When she returned to Overland Park, Volosin told her husband about what she’d experienced. They started looking for something similar, closer to home. She couldn’t find it.

Volosin wondered: if no one is doing it here, could she?

“We were just trying to run the numbers, and I was like, ‘You know what? Why not? I don’t want to regret it,’” she said.

Starting small, Volosin first hosted private parties for friends who volunteered as her “guinea pigs” before taking the concept to pop-up locations.

Two and a half years later, Bespoke Beaute Lab is preparing to open its first permanent storefront in downtown Overland Park.

Bespoke Beaute Lab at 7224 W 79th Street, Overland Park; photo by Taylor Wilmore, Startland News

A new kind of beauty bar

The roughly 795-square-foot space is expected to open in mid-September, Volosin said. The setup will look more like a bar than a traditional beauty shop, with customers sitting at stations and working with a mixologist to create their own lip products.

Customers will choose a base and start experimenting with color. They can adjust the shade, finish and scent, then add ingredients such as moisture, sunscreen or lip plumper before the finished product is poured into a tube or molded into a lipstick.

The process is intentionally flexible, Volosin said. Customers can begin with an idea, try it on, make changes and keep tweaking the formula until they find something they like.

“You could start in a very paint-y mood and end up in purple, so you can kind of just change it up as you start trying it on,” she said.

The lab is expected to offer inspiration sheets organized around warm and cool tones, but Volosin doesn’t want customers to feel like they need to understand color theory before they walk in.

“While I think color theory is important, I think it’s just if you really like a color and then you think it looks good on you too,” she said.

A promotional image for Bespoke Beaute Lab; courtesy photo

Expanding the palette

Viktoria Volosin in a promotional image for Bespoke Beaute Lab; courtesy photo

The Overland Park storefront is set to give Volosin a permanent place to offer the experience while keeping the mobile side of Bespoke Beaute Lab going. The bar is planned to seat about 10 people, with a small back room available for private gatherings, while larger groups can still book the business for homes, hotels and Airbnbs.

Volosin also plans to continue pop-ups around Kansas City, including charity events, and wants to invite other local businesses into the storefront. She wants Bespoke Beaute Lab to remain accessible to people who might not live close enough to regularly visit downtown Overland Park, she said.

The storefront is also the beginning of a larger product vision.

The business could eventually expand beyond lipstick into multi-use sticks and work with color analysts and wardrobe consultants to create custom shades for their clients. Volosin also envisions the Bespoke Beaute Lab expanding across the Midwest, potentially into such markets as Denver and Omaha.

The goal, she said, is to keep the experience approachable as the business grows.

Finding the right formula

Pop-ups and private parties helped Volosin determine what really works with Kansas City customers. One of the biggest lessons, she said, has been realizing how much the business can change with the calendar, with busy periods around holidays followed by slower stretches that initially made her wonder whether the concept was succeeding.

“I remember having so many, ‘Oh my gosh, are we doing the right thing?’ Like, there’s no parties; it’s dried up,” she said. “Then you just kind of realize in the calendar year that things ebb and flow.”

The pop-ups also helped Volosin figure out which local businesses make sense as partners. She wants to eventually bring other small businesses into the Overland Park shop for their own limited-run collaborations.

“I’d love to support them while also complementing us,” she said. “So it kind of works for both of us.”

Viktoria Volosin outside Bespoke Beaute Lab in Overland Park; photo by Taylor Wilmore, Startland News

The Bespoke Beaute Lab experience so far has taught Volosin that customers tend to fall into two groups: makeup lovers looking for a specific color, and people who don’t wear much makeup but want a comfortable place to experiment.

“They actually get to sit and try it, and there’s no rush or pressure,” she said. “Especially when they’re not used to wearing makeup or they don’t know what looks good, they kind of just want to look in the mirror a couple times.”

That feeling of giving others a confidence boost came through during a recent mother-daughter party in Olathe. One mother was dealing with health issues, and while the two spent the evening talking and making their products, she became emotional.

“The mom was tearing up, saying, ‘I just feel really beautiful right now,’” Volosin recalled. “I just had this glow. I was like, ‘It’s not about lip gloss. It is what a little thing like lipstick or lip gloss can do for your soul.’ It was a good reminder of what I’m doing and how special it is just to even create that.”