My experience of London Beauty Week
By Sophie Nutt | 13 September 2019 | Events, News
Yesterday, myself and assistant editor, Kat, had the pleasure of popping to the capital and spending the entire day getting stuck into London Beauty Week, courtesy of the British Beauty Council and Covent Garden London.
After launching on Wednesday (11th September), this year marks the first ever London Beauty Week – and the exciting, innovative and celebratory event comes to a close on this coming Sunday (15th September).
Eager to emerge ourselves fully into everything London Beauty Week had to offer, myself and Kat hurried to the bustling Covent Garden piazza and located the British Beauty Council Hub on Floral Street. Here, co-founder of the British Beauty Council, Millie Kendall MBE, personally greeted each individual guest and encouraged everyone to have a go at ‘spinning the wheel’ (our first of many, we were to discover shortly much to our delight) – on whichever brand the arrow landed, you won a goody from.
After a chat with the British Beauty Council team, collecting our goodies and picking up a map, we set off on our beauty-filled adventure. We made our way around Covent Garden, revelling in all of the delights that London Beauty Week had to offer, in awe of how the infamous area had been totally transformed to celebrate our industry.
An exciting schedule of events from a pop-up ‘beauty playground’ featuring installations from beauty brands, to interactive in-store events and experiences, as well as panel discussions hosted by leading industry experts, were available to passers-by and beauty-lovers alike.
Myself and Kat were lucky enough to receive a relaxing hand massage from Weleda Skin Food, indulge in sweet treats and fragrances at the Miller Harris ice cream van, try our luck on the Floral Street Fragrance spinning prize wheel to discover our ‘perfume persona’ and hop in a dazzling silver Tom Ford taxi celebrating its latest fragrance launch.
“The week is a grande celebratory nod to the sector and truly pays homage to the utter power of the British beauty industry, which you can’t help but feel immensely proud of.”
A variety of beauty brands located in the shopping quarter of Covent Garden also offered guests an amazing itinerary of experiences, masterclasses and treats to take part in. To mention a few: Charlotte Tilbury and MAC Cosmetics put on make-up masterclasses and technique ‘know-how’ tutorials to anyone that was keen to learn, while vlogger, Sophie Hannah Richardson, offered a make-up crash course and greeted fans in the Kiko Store. As well as this, Glossybox hosted a ‘beauty treasure hunt’, where beauty fans were given clues to find a number of hidden golden tickets across the piazza. Those lucky ones that found the golden tickets won a bag containing over £100 worth of beauty goodies from the likes of NARS, Miller Harris and more.
The Beauty Bank is the official charity partner to London Beauty Week and so visitors were invited to drop off unused beauty products at a donation point, which would then be given to the cause. The non-profit organisation, co-founded by Sali Hughes and Jo Jones, provides women, men and young people in need with essential toiletries, fashion products and ‘the little luxuries in life’.
Finally, myself and Kat were excited to end our day by attending the ‘Sustainability is not a slogan’ panel discussion, which saw an expert panel discuss the extremely current and complex topic of sustainability in the beauty industry. The panel was made up of Jayn Sterland, managing director at Weleda UK & Ireland, David Alpert, managing director and co-founder of the International Institute for Anti-Ageing (iiaa) and Anna Teal, global CEO of Aromatherapy Associates and The Refinery. Moderating the discussion and quizzing the expertise of the panellists was Anna Marie Solowij, beauty journalist, brand consultant and co-founder of BeautyMART. The discussion explored what sustainability means for the beauty industry and what makes a business or product truly sustainable.
“The British Beauty Council are delighted to be working with founding patron Covent Garden in creating this dynamic experiential week of beauty,” concludes Millie Kendall MBE. “Beauty is a buoyant sector and contributes significantly to the UK economy. As a growing industry that is a force for good, we are focused on supporting brands and creating jobs via our three pillars: reputation, education and innovation.”
The week is a grande celebratory nod to the sector and truly pays homage to the utter power of the British beauty industry, which you can’t help but feel immensely proud to be a part of.
