It is a privilege to showcase the work of Denise Rabor, a dynamic business woman and the founder of WOW Beauty on the BPL blog! The website was launched to be a one-stop destination for beauty and wellbeing advice for women from all backgrounds.
I asked Denise a few questions, so that we can get to know her better!
BPL: Tell us about yourself.
DR: I am a woman of dual heritage, half Nigerian and half Trinidadian and I celebrate that. My sister and I were brought up between London and New York which for me created a life long passion for diversity and inclusion. I have travelled widely and continue to do so and that gives me a very global perspective on life and on people, that perspective was nurtured by my parents who started off in London but then moved to New York, which is like a second home. I love being a global citizen. Like many women I am different things to different people and like many women in business I am a multitasker.
BPL: Why did you establish WOW Beauty?
DR: WOW Beauty was initially designed to be an inclusive beauty and wellness website, a compliment to my years as an international makeup artist, but as with many business journeys, it has evolved as it has grown. My passion for sharing and celebrating women’s journeys is coming to the forefront via the ‘Wow women Inc’ and ‘My Beauty Journey’ sections, making it more than just a beauty website, the vision is that it becomes a portal that every woman can visit for well-being, beauty and inspiration. The bigger picture is to encourage, inspire and support all women to step into their power and own their beauty and wellbeing. This is especially important to me because unfortunately women of colour whether they are black, brown or any ethnicity other than white are often made to feel invisible, unimportant and have their needs ignored.
Interestingly WOW actually stood for ‘women of the world’, but now it also stands for ‘women own the world’. WOW Beauty is designed as a portal for every woman regardless of her ethnicity or culture.
In many ways WOW beauty is one long note to self it is a reminder to me of all the things that I need to be doing to live my fullest life and I guess that having a reminder to myself it is also something that I can share with every other woman.
I love the concept of viewing ourselves holistically…of looking at ourselves as whole beings – mind, body and spirit – ultimately I think that it’s the only way for us to be our best selves and live our best lives. When we don’t, we feel out of balance and waste a lot of energy dealing with the consequences. I’m always using the hashtag #selfcareisnotselfish
BPL: Your passion for quality product is evident from the content featured on the website and on your social media feeds. What is the driver for this?
DR: As a black woman running an inclusive beauty website, I feel that I have a duty to lead by example and I will not recommend or review any product that I cannot use.
I love good quality in everything. Quality is not always synonymous with price. When it comes to what we put in our bodies and use on our bodies I think that we all deserve the best quality.
BPL: Where do you see WOW Beauty in five years time?
DR: In five years time I would like to see WOW Beauty being a much bigger community of like-minded women helping to educate and inspire and celebrate everything that we are, I love sharing the stories of phenomenal women from all walks of life women who are being true to themselves, who are discovering themselves …women who like me are on a journey.
BPL: Tell me more about your next event, ‘All About Skin’.
DR: In my experience if there’s one thing that all women are concerned with it is their skin. No matter where they’re from or no matter what their culture of their age the one thing that we all want to know about is how to have our best skin ever.
I feel a responsibility to ‘think forward’ which is why my panel of skin experts is diverse: inclusion starts with diversity, diversity of thinking and action. A diverse panel means that all attendees feel seen and catered for which is sadly not always the case at events I’ve attended in the past.
This event is designed to help women get the best expert advice on skin care. It’s designed to help women separate the wheat from the chaff as they say, to step above the noise being made by brands and magazines and fake experts. You know I was speaking to my sister about her skin needs and I advised her to change certain things about her regime etc. and she was like “oh my gosh I really need to attend your event”. It’s that expertise that’ll be offered but at an elevated level from people who’ve actually studied specialisms like dermatology, nutrition, aesthetics’, and much more. Too many women are using products that are the not designed for their skin type and what you’ll find is that these products are doing more damage than good.
Women spend a lot of money on skin care: every time a new product comes on the market you can know that we will be buying it hoping for more glowing skin or better skintone. We all want better skin. This event is designed to enable and empower attendees to make informed choices about their skin care, after all knowledge is power.
‘All About Skin’ takes place on the 8th of November and tickets can be brought here.
Follow WOW Beauty on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook
