Permanent Makeup: 2001 A News Odyssey

  Oh the things you find when you dare enter your storage area! Yikes! Mine is like a huge junk drawer on steroids. It’s bigger than many apartments in Manhattan. And I’m not bragging about it. “I’m just sayin…”

  Naturally, I went in looking for one thing and came out with my arms full. One of the items I came across was a national news story done back in 2001 titled “Cosmetic Tattoos.” It was the first time I was featured by the Associated Press, and a rare occasion when a non-medical doctor is featured at a Society of Plastic Surgical Skin Care Specialists conference.

Take a quick trip back in time with me. How could you not notice the photo of me with the blonde hair? I had it for about a week. And I’m doing permanent blush with a miniature mallet. Both of those are now distant memories in my life.

Interestingly the article began with a permanent makeup for men angle telling the story of a nice man I helped who worked as a hair colorist. Christian James, a natural redhead told the Associated Press reporter, Samantha Critchell, that because his facial hair was so light his face was “like a picture without a frame” before I enhanced his appearance with permanent eyebrows and some work on his eyelids.

I cracked up at reading Christian’s quote about the term “permanent makeup” when he said it struck him as a little too effeminate for him. He said, “Women call it cosmetics. I like to think of it as a tattoo.”

The 2001 news story called permanent makeup the latest craze in cosmetology because of vanity reasons and the “get up and go” era we were in. It covered how more doctors were supporting it including quotes from Brian Kenney, M.D., a certified plastic surgeon in Los Angeles who was using it in his practice.

As always, journalists tell both sides of the story. The subtitle for this piece on cosmetic tattoos was: “What’s gained in time may be lost in versatility.” This was the opinion of Kerry Diamond, author and prominent magazine editor who liked how topical makeup allowed you to look different every day and could be cleaned with “the simple wipe of a washcloth.”

And then there’s Lynn Lutzker, a client turned personal friend of mine. Lynn owns the Exclusively Big and Tall men’s clothing store in Scottsdale, Arizona. She was the victim of bad permanent makeup from someone she described as making her “look like I was wearing American Indian war paint.”

After our challenging work together, Lynn Lutzker went from a panic-stricken woman to one permanently hooked on permanent makeup. She gave this classic quote to the Associated Press about permanent makeup, “I will do it until the day I die.”

So will I Lynn. So will I.