Meet Vanessa Barneby, Friend Of Wild Beauty

We are delighted to introduce the latest friend of Wild Beauty, Vanessa Barneby, co-founder of the Barneby Gates creators of whimsical fabrics and wallpapers with a quintessentially British feel and a wonderful sense of humour.

We are a huge fan of Vanessa’s creations and were delighted to catch up with her to talk all things skincare.

“I’ve always had quite oily skin and started getting spots before all my friends which eventually turned into teenage acne. My mum had the same skin as a young girl and taught me the importance of the ‘cleanse, tone, moisturise’ from an early age.  As a result, cleansing my face before bed has been an engrained part of my bedtime routine for 30 years, well before I was wearing make up. Even if I’m camping at a festival and rolling into the tent at 3am, I will still clean my face!”

Vanessa is a big fan of cleansing milks, that she takes off with organic muslin cloth which works as a super-gentle daily exfoliant which is brilliant for skin prone to blocked pores to keep blackheads at bay – also very good for the environment as you can wash and re-use. A good routine has become super important to her over the years and she always likes to use a serum with hydraulic acid, followed by a small amount of night cream as well as a weekly . rehydrating / decongesting facemask.

We asked Vanessa what she loves most about the Wild Beauty range:

“Being able to trace the provenance of the products right back to the soil in which each and every ingredient grew. Each element has a sourcing story, from soil to seed to beautiful bottle, and I love that”.

Vanessa grew up in a very healthy household where living a healthy lifestyle was just the norm. Regular exercise, plenty of vegetables and a low sugar diet were part of their everyday life, something that is very important to her now with her young family and this continues into her skincare choices:

Having had acne as a teenager, I’ve put so many toxic products on my skin I can’t really bear to think about it. We all know the saying ‘you are what you eat’, but our skin absorbs whatever we put on it too, so it’s important for me to follow the same philosophy for skincare as I do my diet. Organic means working with nature, not against it – there’s simply no place for pesticides or unnecessary synthetics. We analyse the ingredients in the foods we eat, and we should do the same for the products we put on our skin.

At Wild Beauty we know it is important to have balance in our lives, and are always inspired by the friends of the brand to see how they manage this tricky equation. Vanessa is no exception, with a full-time job running Barneby Gates and a mum of 2, she says she doesn’t “sweat the small stuff, but it’s not always that easy!”  she finds walking the dog very therapeutic  after  a stressful day – we couldn’t agree more!

Regular readers will know we always ask our friends of the brand about their Wild Escapes – where they would go in an ideal world and with who, here is Vanessa’s answer:

Tresco Island in the Scilly Isles with my husband Tim and my two children, Lily and Gabriel: specifically time spent in Tresco Abbey Gardens. The air is so clean there – as testified by the beautiful lichen you find growing on everything from graves to benches. When the sun shines on Tresco I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else in the world.