When Lupita Nyong'o walked onto the stage at the 2014 Academy Awards and accepted the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress for 12 Years a Slave, she became the first Kenyan and the first Mexican-Kenyan to win an Academy Award. She was born in Mexico City to a Kenyan father and grew up in Kisumu. Her acceptance speech, in which she spoke about beauty and dreams and the little girl watching television in Kenya, moved millions. She had become one of the most recognised Kenyan faces in the world.