Spectrum Collections

Spectrum Collections is an independent British beauty brand best known for colourful, synthetic makeup brushes. It was founded by Welsh sisters Sophie and Hannah Pycroft, who built the company from a garage in Barry, Wales, and grew it into a multi-channel brand with a flagship store on Carnaby Street in London and distribution through retailers such as Boots. The entire brush range is vegan and cruelty-free, and the brand holds Vegan Society certification [3].

The company remains active. As of 2026 it lists a small team and maintains a following of around 395,500 on TikTok, where it publishes under the handle @spectrumcollections [5].

⚑ Thinner sourcing. The article relies largely on the brand's own statements (T2–T3). Glowpedia is seeking independent sources.

Spectrum Collections was started by sisters Sophie and Hannah Pycroft, who founded the company together in Wales [2]. Sophie had worked as a photographer and Hannah as a graphic designer; the pair set out to build a brand of their own while staying in Wales, and settled on makeup brushes as the product to build it around. As Sophie has put it, "We knew that we could create our own brand, we just needed a product." Seeing the brushes on the market as dull, they chose to stand out by making theirs colourful and pink.

The brand launched in 2013 after roughly a year of research and sampling run out of Sophie's garage in Barry [1]. Corporate records list a company-registration year of 2014, one year later than the launch date reported in founder interviews [4]; the exact founding year is therefore uncertain, with 2013 marking the brand launch and 2014 the company incorporation. The founders have described the early period as demanding, recalling spells "isolated in the garage for around 12 hours a day for the first two years," with no outside funding, mentorship or prior business experience.

After launching with makeup brushes, Spectrum Collections extended into cosmetics, adding a makeup line in 2019 [2]. Over its first years the company grew from a home operation into an international brand, opening a flagship store on Carnaby Street in London and moving into retail through Boots. By September 2018, when the founders were profiled in a startups.co.uk feature, the business reported sales of £12 million [1].

A recurring part of the brand's output has been a series of Disney-licensed brush collections, drawing on titles including Snow White, The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Minnie Mouse and Stitch. The Snow White set, for example, was released as a ten-piece collection, and the founders have cited the Disney collaboration as a highlight of the company's growth.

Spectrum Collections is independently owned and founder-controlled. Corporate data describes it as unfunded, with no external investment rounds raised [4]. The founders have said they turned down investor interest, stating "we're not interested, we don't have an exit plan" and expressing a preference for keeping full control rather than answering to an outside party.

The brand positions itself around bold, colourful design and an entirely animal-free product range. According to the company, its founding logic was straightforward: the sisters believed they could create a brand and needed only the right product, choosing a category they found "all really boring at the time" and differentiating on colour and finish. Its brushes have been marketed on visual appeal, described in the brand's own materials as among the "World's most Instagrammable," and it has used the tagline "Bold, beautiful makeup brushes for total mer-babes." The range has attracted conscious shoppers looking for animal-free tools alongside fans drawn to the collectible, Disney-themed sets.

Spectrum Collections' core products are makeup brushes and brush sets, alongside makeup, makeup bags, sponges and related accessories. The signature line is its colourful, shimmer-finish brushes, and its most publicised products are the Disney-licensed collections.

A defining feature of the range is its use of synthetic bristles in place of animal hair. The brand describes its brushes as vegan and cruelty-free, made with "synthetic makeup brushes rather than using animal hair from squirrels, horses, goats, or minks" [3]. Spectrum Collections holds Vegan Society certification and is also described as PETA-registered [3][4].

The brand has been covered in trade and lifestyle press, including a startups.co.uk "Young Guns" profile of the Pycroft sisters and features by LiveKindly and Disney News on its Disney brush collaborations [3]. In founder interviews, its products have been associated with a celebrity following, with names such as Holly Willoughby and Abbey Clancy cited among endorsers, and appearances noted on television programmes including TOWIE, Geordie Shore and Hollyoaks [2].

Spectrum Collections is an active, operating brand. It maintains a presence across the United Kingdom and further markets, with the Snow White collection noted as available in Europe, Australia and New Zealand. Its TikTok account remained active in 2026 with roughly 395,500 followers, and corporate records listed a small team of seven employees as of April 2026 [4][5].