When it comes to successful skincare brands of the past decade, few have enjoyed such a rise as Dr Barbara Sturm’s eponymous label. Spearheading the doctor-founded beauty brand trend (alongside the likes of Augustinus Bader and Dennis Gross), Sturm’s line began as a whisper among Hollywood A-listers in the Noughties and now, thanks to word of mouth and a strong digital strategy, her white bottles sit in the bathrooms of the most discerning — among them Hailey Bieber, Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, Victoria Beckham, Angela Bassett and Bella Hadid.
A doctor trained in sports medicine, Sturm has a holistic, anti-inflammatory approach to skin health. “Inflammation is a necessary immune response of our bodies,” she says via video call from her chalet in the Swiss mountain resort of Gstaad, “but if it becomes too high we start getting auto immune disease, chronic diseases and we age… we need to keep it under control.”
To do so, she advocates a mostly plant-based diet, regular exercise, avoiding the midday sun, de-stressing as much as possible and aiming for the holy grail of eight hours of sleep. Sounds puritanical? Perhaps. But Dr Sturm, who exercises daily and is in bed by 10pm most nights, is the best advert for this regime. A 50-year-old mother of two daughters (Charly, 26, and Pepper, eight) with a packed schedule of international travel, she has the sort of skin glow typically reserved for teenagers. She’s been getting Botox since she was 30, but her look is very natural.
“I think injectables have a place,” says Sturm, who now thinks she started too young. “It’s about the way you do it — to look beautiful and refreshed.” She believes a gently needled face can have mental health benefits, “because if your face doesn’t look how you feel it can cause a lot of depression, and it’s so easy to fix! All of a sudden, you can feel how your face looks!”
She’s less keen on exfoliate acids and retinols, such a popular part of most brands’ offerings. “I think in big cities people are so busy that there’s often the urge to do quick fixes… The trouble is you can easily cause damage by destroying your skin barrier function and your microbiome, causing inflammation, dryness and all kinds of sensitivity,” says Sturm. “I can always tell when someone has used retinol.”
Dr Sturm will host her first in-person wellness summit at The Stables, Covent Garden, tomorrow and Saturday. It’s set to be Goop-like in its breadth, minus the £1,000 tickets. “I love what Gwyneth does with Goop but really this is a different approach. I am a medical doctor, I come from a scientific background.” While Sturm’s products don’t come cheap — her hyaluronic acid serum is £250 a 100ml pop, and her Glow Drops cost £115 — there will be plenty on offer on the ground floor at the event which won’t cost a penny, from 3D face-scanning and 15-minute express facials, to arcade games with miniature product prizes. A series of nine ticketed masterclasses, workshops and panel discussions will take place on the first floor, with tickets costing £20- £80, redeemable on product.
Where Gwyneth has her jade eggs, Sturm has a vagina clay sculpting workshop in partnership with The Lady Garden Foundation. Following a talk on gynaecological health, London-based artist Poppy Sheppard will help attendees sculpt their own artistic interpretations of a vulva illustration from colourful clay. The idea came after Sturm launched an intimate care range in April 2021, and discovered many women lack awareness of their anatomy. “Women are not taught about their own bodies… Many didn’t really know the difference between vagina and vulva, how it all looks,” says Sturm. “I think it’s quite cool to talk about what we can do better if we understand our bodies better?”
For Newby Hands, Global Beauty Director at Net-a-Porter, it’s this down to earth approach that makes Sturm so appealing, and so successful: “Barbara has always been very connected with women and what they want for their skincare and this woman-to-woman approach is so powerful,” she says. “Her brand is ultimately about great products that deliver, look good and are a joy to use, created by a passionate founder who truly embodies her brand.”
Sturm’s anti-inflammatory approach to skin is rooted in her medical career in orthopaedics, where she helped pioneer the “Kobe Procedure” (as in Kobe Bryant) in which a patient’s blood cells are reinjected into joints to reduce inflammation and slow the ageing process. Translating this into the field of aesthetics, Sturm developed her MC1 cream (a moisturiser that incorporated a patient’s blood plasma) in 2002 and opened a medical clinic in Düsseldorf in 2006. Soon, her clientele began pestering for a full skincare regimen, and in 2014 she launched her blood-free Molecular Cosmetics skincare line, focused on healing and hydration.
Since then she’s opened spas in eight locations (including one on London’s Mount Street, her second clinic to offer injectables), added supplements, teas and haircare to her range and collaborated with fashion brands like Aquazzura and Perfect Moment. Valued by the FT at some $150million, the business has seen revenues grow 10-fold in the past four years. But while some beauty brands have been snapped up by giant conglomerates, Sturm has remained independent.
“With her appetite for innovation, commitment to clinical research and belief in the power of word of mouth, Sturm’s remarkable evolution from whispered insider secret to global skincare domination has been stealthy and oh-so sure,” says ES Magazine Beauty Director Rose Beer.
So what’s next for the skin supremo, I ask? “More spas, more summits, more skincare… it’s a lot of work all this!” she says, laughing. Really, though, it’s clear that this glowing German is driven to help us look and feel our best. “People can make their own choices,” she says, “but if they have more knowledge, they can make better ones.”
