EXCLUSIVE: Byredo Collaborating With Lucia Pica on Makeup

PARIS — Byredo is collaborating with makeup artist Lucia Pica for the next phase of its iconoclastic color cosmetics line’s development.

She most recently served as Chanel’s global creative makeup and color designer.

Byredo burst on to the makeup scene in October 2020 with a collection of products for the lips and eyes that cracked the category’s codes with unconventional hues evocative of emotions, clean formulations, plus unusual packaging, product selection and imagery.

It was the brainchild of Ben Gorham, Byredo’s founder, and makeup artist and collaborator Isamaya Ffrench, now Burberry’s global beauty director.

“I feel like she chose us,” said Gorham, of Pica. “I feel very grateful to be able to work with her. A big part of my brand’s success has been being able to tap into the experience and perspective of such talented people. Lucia joins that group.”

Gorham said he’s greatly enjoyed working with makeup “because I’m back in this very steep learning curve. It reminds me very much of when I founded the company 15 years ago and that emotion of not knowing so much and — more importantly — only seeing possibilities.”

“It’s still a category that I need help with to express,” he continued. “And Lucia brings not only the great deal of experience, but also a shared sensibility. It was a person’s work that I felt related very much to how Byredo had been built, and how it evolved over the 15 years. I felt she could be a great connector of the internal categories that existed between fragrance and makeup, and even byproduct. Her sensibility could live somewhere between those areas.”

Gorham and Pica met through a friend, as has been the beginning of most collaborations for Byredo.

“We had a creative conversation and shared a lot of ideas,” said Gorham. “It was really organic, in how it came about.

“Technically, she is very talented. She also has a sophistication that I think is very interesting,” Gorham continued, saying he is keen to see how that will express itself under the umbrella of Byredo’s creative freedom, and that Pica, who is from Naples, Italy, has an international influence.

“This approach to travel, culture and inspiration is something that’s very Byredo,” he said, adding Pica has blended right in. “It’s felt like she’s been here for a very long time.”

Her priorities are to work closely with Gorham and Byredo’s product marketing team on plans and new ideas. She’s cooking up some shades for existing products that will launch before yearend and innovations for 2023.

The brand’s makeup launch was strong despite being in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic.

Almost two years hence, in the 150 doors where the color cosmetics have been introduced (out of Byredo’s full distribution of 1,000 sales points), makeup can generate 15 to 20 percent of the brand’s overall business in Asia, and between 8 and 12 percent in the western world, according to Byredo global chief executive officer Nicolas Cordier.

Overall, the brand last year rang up net sales of close to 120 million euros, up 63 percent versus 2020.

“We almost doubled the business against 2019,” he said. “So, great momentum.

“We raised a lot of interest, traction and success in the few stores that were still open, but obviously, especially in e-commerce, we sold out very quickly in different parts of the world,” added Cordier.

Last year the makeup offer was expanded with new products and shades, and its distribution was grown in a controlled manner.

Byredo’s color cosmetics bestsellers are its lipstick and mascara. It has a strong global footprint, save for in Latin America.

“Today, our clear two priorities in terms of markets are the USA and China, markets using makeup with different approaches,” said Cordier, calling Byredo “a modern luxury 360 beauty brand.

“As a brand, we want to be diverse and understand local needs, emotions and behaviors. We don’t want to dictate, so we resonate very well with different consumers in the different geographies.”

Gorham has had many learnings along the way in regard to the makeup business.

“Obviously, there is a commercial component that’s been incredible to watch and take part in,” he said. “More importantly, with fragrance I always found that its smell was completely subjective. So people were having personal experiences and interpretations of smells that we were making, and it was something that we welcomed and understood. We were nondictating in our way of presenting and communicating fragrance.

“With color, not only do people have interpretations, they have unique expressions,” said Gorham. “I was kind of blown away that even though it was premeditated to create a toolbox of colors for people to express themselves, I don’t think I quite understood how many iterations, how many expressions would exist. I’ve been humbled a bit by how big the world is, and how important it is for self-expression.”

He said that counter-current to the news-driven makeup business, for its color cosmetics Byredo has focused on creating timeless products, as in its other categories. Therefore the brand has eschewed launching many products nonstop.

“I’ve learned a lot, and we continue to. I have incredible teams that know much more than me,” said Gorham. “I get to sit in the middle and add my two cents, and try to disrupt some of these ways of doing things.”

Gorham explained he has spent many years pivoting Byredo’s business into different categories.

“Most importantly, to shift the perception of what we could be,” he said. “I think makeup has really become the proof that if you spend enough time and energy in defining who you want to be, that people will actually listen. And I believe, yes, we make incredible products, and I’m very proud of that. But I also think the world has evolved to a point where it’s much more open to multiple mediums, the multiple expression of people and brands, even when, like myself, they’re outsiders and have virtually no training.

“So I’d like to take credit for our success lots of times,” said Gorham. “But I truly believe that the world has evolved to a very interesting place and continues to do that, and that part of our success comes from that change.”

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