Beyond Skin Deep

After walking away from her namesake brand, Bobbi Brown is proving reinvention can be as powerful as invention

- H. ALAN SCOTT

OWN TERMS - From the brand name to retail strategy, Brown is doing her second act differently.

FOR BOBBI BROWN, PATIENCE ISN'T A VIRTUE; it's an obstacle. The makeup artist and entrepreneur operates on a timeline dictated by instinct, not corporate calendars.

"I have no patience," Brown tells Newsweek in a wide-ranging conversation about her new memoir, Still Bobbi. "Like I go in and I say, 'Oh, I love this new product, when are we getting it? February?' I'm like, 'Hell no, bring it out in November. I don't care it's not in a package."

This drive is the engine behind her entire career. Still Bobbi chronicles the story of a woman who built a billion-dollar beauty empire in her own name, Bobbi Brown Cosmetics, only to walk away from it in order to start over (again), this time on her own terms with a new makeup brand, Jones Road Beauty.

"I do hope and I do think that my story is empowering to people," Brown says. "And they're like, 'Well, look, if she did this and she went through this, then I could do this."

In order to understand Brown's second act, you need to grasp the sheer gutsiness of her beginning.

"My husband and I started Bobbi Brown Cosmetics before it even had a name, out of our home in Montclair, New Jersey, when we were 32 years old," she says. "I made a lipstick and I sold it to people. We were indie beauty people before there was a name saying indie beauty people."

A Revolution of Common Sense

Eventually, Bobbi Brown Cosmetics exploded into department stores, becoming an in-demand commodity before ultimately being purchased by Estée Lauder in 1995 for a reported $74.5 million. Estée Lauder retained Brown as the one in creative control of the brand, effectively making her an employee.

Brown's philosophy toward makeup has remained the same ever since.