Celebrating women in aesthetics on IWD
Teresa de Graça, the founder of Pure Swiss Aesthetics, shared a couple of women that she found inspirational: “Dr Shirin Lakhani is an amazing and passionate doctor as well as a strong businesswoman. Her holistic approach to medical aesthetics has led her to become a leading figure in aesthetics, particularly when it comes to women’s health."
“Andrea Farrelly [Skin & Body Works owner] is passionate and incredibly knowledgeable about skin and aesthetics,” she continued. “Her business acumen has allowed her to turn her passion into a very successful business in Ireland, Skin & Body Works, that I and Pure Swiss Aesthetics are very happy to work with.”
The Aesthetic Consultant, Dr Vanessa Bird, noted that all the women she meets in the industry are inspirational. “There are so many strong, innovative, and successful women in our industry so every woman I have had the pleasure to work with has inspired me in some way."
“Dr Rita Rakus instantly stands out. She is incredibly successful, experienced, and generous and never hesitates to share her knowledge and time with others in the industry to help and support them. She is an inspiration to everyone who meets her. Jenny Pabila of Niche PR is also inspirational. She works hard behind the scenes going above and beyond for her clients and has a wealth of industry knowledge and contacts. She always has time to give you a pep talk, advice and to celebrate your successes. The industry needs more people like Jenny!”
Dr Inna Szalontay, founder of Libi & Daughters looked to history for her inspiration: “Madam C J Walker was an entrepreneur who became the first black woman millionaire in America. She made her fortune creating a range of personalised hair care products, the ‘Walker System’, following her own experience with hair loss. The self-made millionaire used her fortune to fund scholarships for women at the Tuskegee Institute and donated large parts of her wealth to multiple charities, including the NAACP, and the Black YMCA. Her story and actions have inspired female entrepreneurs ever since, including everyone here at Libi & Daughters, as we create our own range of personalised skincare products.”
Visiting Professional Beauty London over the weekend, we met loads of people who were excited to share their female inspiration with us.
“Katie Piper went through a big reconstruction of her face,” said Charles-Edouard Delelis-Fanien, general manager at LPG. “Her strong will was, for me, a big inspiration. Her foundation has helped people get through some very difficult times.”
Others commented on the sheer number of women in this industry that are inspirational. Lutifye Palu Ibrahim, sales director at Opatra, said “There are so many wonderful, amazing, women in the aesthetics industry, that champion the sector. It’s so hard to pinpoint just one specific person that I would want to mention.”
Hayley Jones, sales and marketing director at Lynton shared this sentiment, praising women who have made the leap to open their own clinics. “I see so many brave women in this industry, and it’s actually something I talk about quite a lot within Lynton. We empower women in this industry, to be the full boss of everything. They’re doing HR, they’re doing finance, they’re doing absolutely everything and still staying on top of their game in terms of clinical output. So, every single person who has taken that step to leave secure employment, to leave the NHS, and to actually set up their own clinic, I think every single one of them is inspirational.”
Business manager at BTL, Eddie Campbell, talked about working with women, and why he enjoys being in the aesthetics industry at the moment. “There are so many inspirational women in our sector, and I think that’s a great thing about the aesthetics sector, that there are so many female KOLs and role models within the industry. People like Rita Rakus who we’ve been working with for years, Sherina Balaratnam, and Dr Galyna Selezneva. There are so many, I just can’t say them all, but we’re really excited to work with them. We’re also excited that women’s health is being more talked about, it’s really exciting.”
Personal heroes were also brought up. Rebecca Peters, business development manager at DermaluxLED, named her manager as an inspiration for her. “She has taught me lots of different things. She is really knowledgeable and has worked with some great brands in the industry.”
Tim Stevens, sales manager at Candela mentioned some of the company’s clients. “We have a fantastic doctor - Kathryn Taylor-Barnes, who’s at the Real You Clinic in Twickenham. She uses one of our devices called the Nordlys, and the outcomes that she gets are fantastic. She’s done some amazing things treating melasma, a real problem for women, which she’s managed to overcome in a couple of very impressive cases.”
Personally, as someone who is new to the industry, it has been a great learning experience, meeting and speaking to all these people about some of the women they are inspired by. I was able to see a panel of incredible, powerful women, discuss the changing legislation around the aesthetics sector, at Professional Beauty London. Their passion and knowledge on the subject were truly inspiring.
Patient advocate Dawn Knight is a wonderful speaker, and I found myself very moved by not only her presentation but also by the kindness she treated everyone with. The high interest around legislature right now makes it a sensitive subject, and I was so impressed with the direct way the panel handled it.
Overall, the consensus of everyone we spoke to was that they were overjoyed to work in the aesthetics sector, alongside so many incredible women, who are achieving and pushing the industry forward, every day.