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From the sofa in the waiting room on the second floor of Calle Sagasta, 21, in Madrid, one of the four (low, first, second, third) that has occupied in that building the beauty center of Carmen Navarro, you can see a signed and dedicated photo, in his own handwriting, of the royal wedding of Felipe VI and Doña Letizia.

The curious viewer does not miss the Queen's dedication: "A kiss and thank you!". Because the former journalist is just one of the clients who have passed through the hands of the beautician in the 50 years of trajectory that celebrates this 2023; the list is endless and includes Tamara Falcó or Arturo Fernández, the few names that the beauty expert drops; Discretion, one of the secrets of its success, obliges.

From his home... to stardom

The seven beauty centers that Carmen Navarro has today in Spain (in Madrid, Seville and Valencia) do not suggest that this Madrilenian born in 1942 was destined to dedicate herself to her work. "My father said that I was not good for studying, and that his daughters did not go to work as long as he lived. In the end we have done it all, a lot, "she summarizes, at the foot of the canyon at 80 years old.

Although she never practiced, Carmen Navarro studied secretarial and was awarded the title by Minister Ruiz-Giménez in 1961.

Also his accidental beginnings in aesthetics, with some classes as a hobby in a beauty center that he was passionate about -"I had not stepped on one in my life"-, 30 already fulfilled and three children behind him, between nine and five years old, seemed to predict what today we could call the chronicle of a failure foretold.

The same happened with her first steps as a beautician: "I told my husband to leave me the office at home; I set up a booth to give massages and, as I was embarrassed to charge, it seemed a horror, I had nothing businesswoman, I hired someone to do it. I took another room, people who came to have treatments came into the kitchen, stayed to eat... In the third room I occupied, my husband told me that there was no one to put up with it."

This is how Navarro began his empire today, first in "a cuchitril in San Bernardo, in a bass that belonged to some nuns"; from there to four or five years he moved to a first interior, "where we had a great time: actors came, aristocracy, all by word of mouth and because it was a very discreet place," Navarro recalls.

Eight cabins and five people doing treatments there, always with Carmen Navarro as the first sword, because what she liked is to do the treatments, her favorite part of the business, made the space stay small and it was the turn of the flagship today, that of Sagasta, 21, to which are added today another four in Madrid, Seville, Valencia...

In the 90s, Carmen Navarro performing a treatment with appliances.D.R.

The hands of Carmen Navarro, the secret of her success

In Spain, according to data from Stanpa (National Association of Perfumery and Beauty), there are just over 22,000 beauty centers, a figure that makes two things clear: that we like to take care of ourselves and that excelling in such a business is not easy. Navarro corroborates it from his half century of experience, "getting there is easy, the difficult thing is to stay; You have to be aware of the latest and the best, always thinking about customers, the most important and the first thing."

Carmen Navarro considers herself a bad businesswoman who has been able to surround herself with the best professionals in her own (among them today her eldest daughter, Almudena, who after leaving banking is dedicated to accounting, what Navarro likes least, including charging, which continues to give her a lot of trouble) to dedicate herself in hands and soul to the skin, his passion. "I'm creative, and I say the same thing as Antonio Banderas: there are people who have everything programmed, and I'm intuitive, I see a product and tell you if I like it or not." For that reason, she continues, "if I were more businesswoman than person I would be Botín, but I do not want to see the dollar in each client."

The phrase that she dedicates herself to her profession in hands and soul is not a saying, it is her manual treatments that have made her famous, and for which her faithful return. And, although she retired from doing treatments already before the pandemic, from time to time she takes up a little bit of that first primal passion. "The day before yesterday I did a facial. It was hilarious. A lady with a skin problem arrived at seven minus twenty and she had a very new girl [that's how she refers to her beautician, 'girls' or 'girls'], so I got into doing the most complicated part of the treatment. At one point I handed over to the beautician and the lady exclaimed, 'Are you going to leave me?' He told me he was going to send me Toledo oil because it's the best thing they had ever done to him."

Carmen Navarro leaves such a deep mark on her clients that, to maintain the excellence of her manual treatments, she prepares her 'girls' to exhaustion. He says that his latest signings have been learning since September and so far he has not 'touched' customers. "They are like trees, I have them all day looking at them and I do not even let them touch the feet of the clients..."

Even so, for Navarro the most important thing in aesthetics is not the diagnoses or the protocol itself, but the follow-up, the 'coaching', "we are the coaches of aesthetics. When a client starts a treatment she is very optimistic, but suddenly another day comes and tells you that nothing is noticeable... Tonimarla and direct it is our job, to know how to listen ...", explains the expert.

In state-of-the-art appliances, Carmen Navarro has always been at the forefront, not only from her hands lives excellence. "I believe in preventive aesthetics, in a radiofrequency, in cell regeneration..."

Next to an anti-flaccidity facial laser machine, in the 90s.D.R.

Success Doesn't Come Alone: A Life of Effort

It is inevitable to remember María Esteve and her long list of favorite pastas in 'The other side of the bed' - "spaghetti, macaroni, noodles, bows ..."- when Carmen Navarro starts talking about all the aesthetic techniques she has learned: "Acupuncture, shiatsu, reflexotherapy, sophrology, mind control, lymphatic drainage ...".

Traveling the world for this has been one of the constants of her 50 years, whether to Barcelona or Paris, Tibet, Nepal or Indonesia, because she is a pioneer in Spain in oriental techniques and has rubbed shoulders with lamas of several generations. Even a great Buddha presides over the star cabin of his center in Sagasta, although this has given him some displeasure ... "One day they call me from the Ritz Hotel, a sheikh who came to a state meeting for the union of religions wanted a massage. We reserve the space for him, with that huge Buddha... He arrives with his bodyguards, sees him, says he has forgotten something in the car and does not return. That gentleman had nothing to do with the union of religions!"

With Lama Gangchen, on one of his trips to learn ancestral oriental techniques.D.R.

Trips, courses, training, everything to always give the best to your customers ... Has it meant giving up a lot? "You can't imagine the amount of weekends I've spent away to learn, with which I have sacrificed my children, my family... I cheated on my husband, I said: 'I have a course, but I come to eat'; Then I called him to eat and I arrived after seven."

Learning in times of crisis

Half a century in business gives for good moments, like this 2023 of celebration, and bad, although not so much if you look at them with Navarro's optimistic prism. "In all these years I have experienced very big economic crises; However, for aesthetics they have meant little and, specifically for me, they have been moments of improvement, "he says.

According to the National Institute of Statistics, it is a fact: in bad times beauty is maintained or rises. Precisely for those customers who continue to spend what they earn on aesthetics, this doyenne of beauty always seeks excellence, "so that they do not feel that this or that treatment is a scam".

For that reason, and although she feels very grateful to all those celebrities, like the Queen, who have believed in her, "who has more value is that girl who works, saves and comes to make a body or facial with me," she insists. Another reflection on the famous clientele, although it arouses curiosity about its beauty centers, is a double-edged sword, "because people think that we charge very high when it is not. The best thing is word of mouth, if someone arrives already recommended and convinced you do not have to sell, just do your job. "

Carmen Navarro today. JAIME BOIRA

In the blacksmith's house, stick knife?

And how does Carmen Navarro take care of herself, if she takes care of herself? "I have a personal trainer and in other times an external masseur came to my centers to give me massages. I liked that they were men, and from outside, because with my team I do not relax, I put myself in a critical plan. Instead, it has happened to me in treatments at Harrod's, in London, or in Japan, that I have not even noticed, I lie on the stretcher and wake up at the end of how much I relax."

And at home? "At home I have devices, I do the facials, I have a Neopen [a microneedling device or small needles, transdermal mesotherapy], a Wishpro [with magnetic current heads] and I pass them while watching online courses or series."

Active until the body endures

Navarro no longer does treatments as such, but diagnoses, follow-ups or videos for his social networks, because you have to always be up to date, and he goes every day to his centers and not to mention retiring -"Nooooo!" -.

The 'ikigai' governs their life, a Japanese concept that in the culture of Okinawa is conceived as a reason to get up in the morning and to which it is attributed that its inhabitants have a long life. Long live, that of Carmen Navarro, who has been sustained by intuition, spontaneity and that of not doing to others what you do not like to be done to you: "Few centers close on Saturdays, mine do. If I don't like working on Saturdays, why would my team like me?"

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