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Remi Asthen Cruz

Remi Ashten Cruz is a 24-year-old YouTube sensation, known for her videos related to fashion, makeup, fitness, healthy eating, and dance. Cruz has two majorly successful YouTube channels. Her main channel, “MissRemiAshten,” holds more than 2.5 million subscribers as of 2019. This channel consists of highly-produced, formal videos. Her second channel, “RemLife,” holds more than 1.2 million subscribers as of 2019, consisting of casual vlogs of her going about her day.

Early Life

Remi Ashten Cruz was born on February 7th, 1995 in Anaheim, California, USA. Cruz is part Korean, part Guamanian, and much of her Korean side is shown through her expressed liking of Korean cuisine. By the early age of 5, Cruz’s mother enrolled her into dance lessons, and from then on, she began to participate in competitive dance all through her [[childhood] and adolescent years. In secondary school, Cruz joined the school’s dance team, where she met one of her best friends, Bree Nicole, and now the two choreograph and record music videos of them dancing together. Videos with Nicole have become a staple on Cruz’s channels. After high school, Remi Cruz enrolled at the University of California, where she studied Psychology and joined the Delta Gamma Sorority. In a YouTube video on her main channel, approximately one year after commencing university in 2014, Cruz stated how she was not enjoying her time in post-secondary, much of it having to do with bullying and her field of study. Within that video, she announced that she would be taking some time off from school, until the next school year, when she would begin fresh with her new major of Business, Marketing, & Communications. Throughout the same year Cruz released this video, she moved to the core of Los Angeles to further pursue her YouTube career. At this time, she also adopted a Maltese Shih Tzu mix, also known as a Mal-shi, puppy and named her Daisy May. Cruz still currently resides in downtown Los Angeles but had dropped out of university before finishing her degree.

YouTube Career

The first video published on Remi Cruz’s main YouTube account, “MissRemiAshten,” was on April 1st, 2012. The video was filmed to show what she had bought in preparation for a summer camp she was about to attend . Her hobby of content creating took off from there.

Throughout her initial years on YouTube, Cruz focused her content on DIY tutorials, makeup tutorials, and fashion lookbooks. As her viewership grew, so did the production of her videos as the monetary compensation she received from YouTube assisted her to invest in her higher quality videography tools. Cruz gradually made changes to her content themes, going from DIY and fashion videos, to making her way through makeup tutorials and chatty videos that keep her audience up-to-date with various current events going on in her life, such as her experience with scary neighbors. Much of her content still involves makeup, but less so than her previous years on YouTube. As of 2017, Cruz has integrated content regarding her fitness journey, healthy eating, cooking and baking, collaboration with numerous household-name brands, such as Gillette as she and the company joined forces to create her own razor, and advertisements with SoulCycle and Nike. As Remi Cruz formed a space for herself on YouTube and other social media platforms, such as Instagram and Twitter with her unique and animated online personality, she has developed an enormous and loyal fanbase. Cruz has found great success since beginning her YouTube career, having a net worth of $2 million as of 2019.

From Remi Cruz’s time on YouTube, she has developed bonds with numerous YouTubers within the same beauty and lifestyle niche as herself. Cruz is a member of the “Asian Girl Squad,” a friend group composed of four Asian-American beauty and lifestyle vloggers, Remi Ashten Cruz, Tiffany Ma, Lauren Riihimaki, and Mia Stammer. The “Asian Girl Squad” often collaborated for each other’s videos in the mid-2010s, and through that they grew meaningful connections with each other away from YouTube as they became closer from the fact that they were all new to living on their own in Los Angeles.

Apart from her main channel, “MissRemiAshten,” Cruz also has her vlogging channel, “RemLife,” where she documents more frivolous content, such as day-to-day life, workout classes, her favourite meals, behind-the-scenes of photo and video shoots, running errands, and travelling with friends.

New Businesses and Brands

On top of Remi Cruz's two flourishing YouTube channels, she began her skincare line in 2018, "HoneyPop," a DIY face mask company that allows their customers to customize treatments for their specific facial needs, such as acne, blackheads, breakouts, and dull skin. Cruz has dealt with acne and acne scarring for most of her adolescent and young adult life. The creation of "HoneyPop" not only allowed her to care for her skin, but lets her help others conquer stubborn blemishes as well.

Remi Cruz has also partnered with fellow YouTube beauty and lifestyle vlogger, Alisha Marie, to create their podcast, "Pretty Basic," which launched November 1st, 2018. The two use their conversational podcast as a platform to connect deeper with their social media supporters and fans, and give listeners further insight into their lives as they speak about topics regarding love, family, friends, and self-growth.

Weight Loss

As of September 2017, Remi Cruz began to change her lifestyle for the better of her physical health. She began eating healthier and exercising more frequently. At the beginning of her weight-loss journey, Cruz worked out five to six times a week and ate the minimum number of calories that was suggested for her age, height, and weight. In 2018, she had opened up about her physical state affecting her mental health as she started to lose a significant amount of weight within her first year of healthy living. In Remi Cruz’s video on her “RemLife” channel, titled “the truth about everything,” Cruz discloses the fact she had dealt with body dysmorphic disorder during the first year of her weight-loss. She also confronts demons in a video she collaborated with on Niki Demartino’s YouTube channel, in a YouTube series called, “The Truth About,” where Demartino provides a space for YouTubers open up about their largest insecurities on-camera so viewers and fans who idolize these influencers for leading a “perfect” life can understand that YouTubers face hardships as well.

Since the release of these videos, Remi Cruz is living a much healthier life now, physically and mentally. In February 2019, Cruz released a video on her main channel about seeing Dr. Philip Goglia, a professional nutritionist who has worked with numerous celebrities in Hollywood to attain their ideal body shape, either for a specific character portrayal or personal fitness. One of his most famous clients is Kim Kardashian.

However, due to her publicizing her weight-loss journey, Remi Cruz has found herself to be the victim of cyberbullying, slut-shaming, and body-shaming. Many social media users, mostly across the platforms of YouTube, Instagram, and Twitter, have commented on Cruz's health and fitness journey, saying inappropriate statements, such as that she is losing weight only to grab attention on social media. Such words have left the social media influencer confused and insecure.