To spend time in Melanie Grant’s world is to realise there’s a more pared back, refined approach to take with your skin care, and possibly your life. The skin stalwart opened her first studio in 2012 in Sydney’s Double Bay, followed by her Melbourne studio in Armadale in 2016, before establishing her first permanent international presence in none other than LA’s Melrose Place in 2019. On the eve of the pandemic, Melanie put the finishing touches on her brand new Double Bay studio, celebrating nearly a decade of treating Australia’s A-list faces in her home city. Then there’s her biannual residency in Paris, which coincides with each Fashion Week and is among the hottest tickets in town for grey-faced glitterati in need of getting their glow back, and key consultancy roles with Chanel (she is the first and only person, globally, to be named their Skin Expert) and Augustinus Bader.
Over the phone during her daily beach walk, and on the eve of jetting off to Paris, Melanie tells us why, in this age of chronic personal oversharing, she has decided to let her work speak for itself, and makes excellent arguments for curating your skincare routine into an (admittedly, ideally rather chic) wardrobe, containing only those products you know will make you look and feel your best.
When it comes to treatments, we can do so much for ourselves at home.
Not everyone can afford a monthly facial, and doing lovely hydrating, nourishing masks at home is an excellent choice. People are often surprised I do a lot of my facials at home, adding a mask into my night time regime in the bath. It takes the pressure off feeling like everything has to be done in a salon. There are at-home versions of so many lower key treatments like peels, and LED light therapy. If you can get one of these in a salon, then great, as they will be more powerful, but there are some pretty good options for using yourself home. The Dermalux Flex MD LED is great, although it does have a high price point. Do be careful with microdermabrasion and needling at home, though. People are using cheap derma rollers which aren’t even made from stainless steel, so they get blunt easily and cause tiny, pitted scars. When we use skin needling pens in clinic, we do the face, then change the cartridge for the neck, then again for the chest – we don’t ever reuse one cartridge in a different area, even on the same client, because even on our gold standard version, the needles are blunted after that single use.
You need to be very discerning about what you’re doing and why. Also, remember that there’s no point having certain treatments if there’s nothing to treat. I spoke with someone recently who had lovely skin and wanted me to do Fraxel on her. I refused, because she simply didn’t need it, and she eventually found a practitioner who agreed to do it. What for? You need to question the integrity of someone doing a treatment on you if you don’t need it – it’s unethical.
