Beauty, Experts, Makeup, Skincare
Prior to the event I received an email from a woman I had never met. The email was to introduce herself and to wish me luck. The woman who had taken the time to send these kind greetings was Eryca Freemantle. I had recently seen a video and read about Eryca and I remember thinking at the time this is a woman I would like to meet. Since starting Fighting Fifty I have had the opportunity to meet some extraordinary women, some who have created companies and products, others who have mastered treatments and techniques, business owners, and even Sally Kettle, the first woman to row the Atlantic Ocean twice from East to West! Each and every one has inspired me in different ways.
It’s said that you made an impression on someone in the first 3 seconds of meeting them, and Eryca certainly did that. She is a woman of great beauty, striking and with an amazing presence. Despite having terrible back pain she had been determined to make the event. Let me tell you a little about Eryca’s achievements, she is a multi award winning international makeup artist who has worked with celebrity clients including Yasmin Le Bon, Seal and Whitney Houston, cosmetic companies and glossy magazines. Eryca is often asked to speak at everything from trade shows, to key conferences such as Women Shaping the World, and was asked speak at the Woman for Change initiative, addressing a crowd of 16,000 including HRH Dame Patience Jonathan. As well as writing for a number of leading magazines both here and abroad, Eryca has been awarded the PAWIIN award for her contribution and innovation to Africa in beauty, fitness and empowerment, presented by Nigeria’s Minister of Women’s Affairs.
The All Women of Colour campaign was spearheaded by Eryca, partnered with the Olympia Beauty Show; the largest beauty show in Europe. The campaign highlights the imbalance of makeup products available for Women of Colour. If it’s difficult for women in their fifties to find suitable skincare or colour cosmetics, just imagine how difficult it is for Women of Colour, when their skin tone isn’t even catered for. Eryca is looking to address this situation with the beauty industry to make them aware of emerging markets and for them to appreciate the power of the black pound.
With her outstanding experience and talent as a makeup artist, Eryca is looking to develop a range of colour cosmetics specifically for Women of Colour, while her other ambition is to write a regular magazine or newspaper column making makeup and skincare assessable to all women.
I imagine reading this you are as impressed with Eryca’s biography as much as I was meeting her. So you can imagine my surprise when Eryca told me that listening to me talking about my life, and growing up had inspired her to write about her own life and feelings as a child. Eryca shares her journey here in words which must have been so painful to write.
As a little 4 year old going to school every day I was very confused and hated me. That was my first experience of chronic depression. I lived with it all my life and had no idea it was abnormal. It felt very normal to me.
It became a way of life, going to school in South London, being spat upon, kicked in the stomach, knocked in the head, being called black attack, being called frog, and big eye monster. Not for a day or two, or even a term or three, but from the age of 4 to 30 plus. I remember standing at the bus stop waiting to get the bus home, this was at secondary school, one of my class mates, came up to me at the bus stop. In front of all our other school peers, slapped me in the face, spat in my face, then pulled me by the collar along the ground, why? Just because she could. This went on for over 7 years.
Would you believe this was the same friend that would knock for me every morning to go to school, coming to my parents’ home to get breakfast before we went to school, then when we were there beating me to the pulp. This went on for years and I never told a soul. It tore me apart; it killed this little ugly British black girl. I ended up hating living, having suicidal thoughts and not even being brave enough to do that. I unfortunately fell through the net at school, just managing to scrape through with my education. I became the class clown, wanting everyone to like me; I had already sold my soul. Hey I am ugly right, why did I need to read and write, why did I need to share my story with any authorities. I would only get more beatings. I fell into that Self Fulfilling Prophecy, failure, no self-worth, black, ugly and British.
To top it all I got involved in a car accident, leaving me with over 200 scars to my face, loss of my hair and near amputation of my left leg. This was conformation of my true British ugliness. Black pretty girls didn’t want me as their friend, my white friends treated me as normal as they could. That was the beginning of me beating up on me.
Self-abuse, detrimental relationships, desperate to be liked I withdrew more from society. I had to learn to survive. To leave the house I had to cover my scars and discoloration from my accident, I used my mother’s foundation with mud, applied it to my face, this was my first encounter with makeup. The only thing mud turns to clay; my time in the real world was only 2 hours long. The self-abuse stared again, the suffering, the depression, the hatred. Born black British ugly and depressed. What a pitiful life.
A friend who went on to become a super model, went to a photo shoot and asked me to go with her, the makeup artist, did turn up but what she did was terrible. My friend asked me to do her makeup. I had no idea what to do, but I felt an overwhelming sense of freedom and creativity. I just let loose, creating beauty upon beauty. Need I say that was the beginning of the beginning. I went on to do a makeup course and passed with distinction. Before long, I was working with the likes of Seal, Soul to Soul, superior magazines and organizations. I started writing make up courses for London College of Fashion, meeting the best of the best in the business. I now sit on the panel for LCF as an industry advisor.
I am now one of the leading authorities in the UK when it comes to makeup and skincare for women of colour. I am the ambassador for a campaign called All Women of Colour launched at Olympia Beauty Show. I am the person the UK beauty industry comes to, to analyse the imbalance in the beauty industry. The biggest project of my life is working with mainstream British beauty Industry, creating makeup and skin care lines for all women’s skin tones.
Is this the same little ugly, British girl who had no hope in life, who accepted abuse as a normal way of life, who didn’t know where she belonged, who travelled the world searching for her soul? Not realizing her soul and heart beat was where she left it in South London. When revisiting my old family home 2 years ago. (We left that house 45 years ago) I have been able to reflect and look at my deeper self.
Have I dealt with my demons? Every day is a new day, but I do know who I am? – YES.
