At Pansy Esthetics, the focus is on gender-affirming scar care
While Emmett Preciado was lying on a massage table, a halo of light surrounded its bare torso while Leola Davis was brushing soapy water on weak red lines under his nipples. In the dark room of this small Hollywood West studio on Boulevard Santa Monica, the bed is the altar of healing of Davis, its hands offering sacred care.
Leola Davis provides the actor and Model Emmett Preciado, who is a trans man, with superior surgery to help pigmentation and skin scars.
(Jireh Deng)
“It’s extremely intimate,” said Davis, a queer-under-license-in-law specializing in facial treatments and post-operative consequences for transgender and non-binary people. Often, she is the first person to touch a client’s chest after being operated. “I want people to feel loved and neat when they come here.”
At his workstation, Davis is dressed with casualness for comfort in black sweats and a t -shirt – this allows him to move easily in a profession that requires that his hands be free at any time. In Trans Pride Colors, its baseball cap reads as follows: “Protect trans children”.
Davis, 40, is a late Bloomer self-written in the skin care industry. She moved to Los Angeles de Seattle in 2018 to be with her girlfriend and worked as a bookseller at Book Sou for almost two years before having her first face in 2019 – an experience that changed the trajectory of her life.
The esthetician Leola Davis started Pansy Esthetics in 2021 after realizing that there was a need for his services, especially in the Trans community.
(Jireh Deng)
By sharing his facial experiences with his friends, Davis realized that a large part of his community – queer people, trans people and people of color – had never had a facial care. She wanted to do something and started the Esthetician school in December 2019.
“This industry is so oriented towards white women, CIS, thin women,” said Davis about the beauty sector. When Davis, a black woman Cisgenre, decided to start the aesthetics of Pansy in 2021, she thought of communities which are often excluded from the stories surrounding traditional beauty standards. “Everything that has entered my business was:” How can I make it accessible as many people as possible? “” She said.
Davis went to school specializing in acne facial treatments and quickly found that a large part of this knowledge resulted well for the healing of the scar fabric for trans people who have undergone facial feminization or chest male surgery. To approach the scars, Davis uses treatments invented by Danné Montague-King, a gay man and a cosmetic chemist who has developed a range of care products designed to treat hyperpigmentation from acne scars.
But it took Davis for a while to understand how to make an inclusive diet because she found no guide or training for beauticians on how to treat people who have undergone sexual surgery. Even by treating people with dark skin, she found that the esthetician school was sorely lacking in offering knowledge.
“You cannot use certain types of lasers on darker skin,” said Davis about people using laser treatment for hair removal. People of color also easier when their skin is damaged. “Many estheticians do not continue their education on the treatment of brown skin outside the school, and it is very apparent in the treatment room.”
Leola Davis prepares a treatment which she will apply to the skin of Emmett Preciado.
(Jireh Deng)
It took time, but as a group of a woman, she has built a list where she sees around 20 customers per week who come for two -hour sessions. She also sells courses on how other estheticians can learn to treat transgender people. It is always such a rare in the skin care industry that a person flies from the United Kingdom to Los Angeles for the services of Davis.
Preciado, a model and actor that appeared in “Good Disorder” and other Hollywood projects, is one of its regular customers. He comes for a treatment to fade pigmentation on his superior surgery scars of ten years and treat the cheloids along his left forearm where doctors took a skin transplant and a nerve for his phalloplasty in 2019.
He said that DMK alkaline washes were so effective that his scars went back to his arm and almost faded on his chest.
Emmett Preciado is one of the regular customers of Leola Davis in his studio space in West Hollywood.
(Jireh Deng)
“After our treatments, I said to myself:” Wait for a second. I think I want to stop because I don’t want them to fade and disappear completely, ‘said Preciado, who is proud of his trip as a transgender man and shares his story with thousands of followers on Instagram. But under the Trump administration, while transgender people face vitriol and hatred, Preciado continued the treatments, opting for security. “Now that people know more about trans people, they know what the scars look like,” said Preciado. “I want to feel safe in a men’s locker room or a shirtless bathroom.”
At this political moment, Davis has the impression that his business has taken on an increased meaning of the objective and the mission, in particular with the legislation and the anti-trans feeling across the United States. While Davis works with his clients, her hands could be soft, but she is also fierce as to her policy and support for the LGBTQIA +community.
As an excuse as it is, Davis had trouble finding a place that would kiss him as well as his customers with open arms. Previously, she worked in Beverly Hills, a space that sometimes felt hostile, she said.
Now at REPUBLIC SALON, where the Rainbow Pride flags and trans pink, pink and white flags are displayed, Davis is grateful to be surrounded by more than a dozen independent queer companies and many others who also rent workspaces in the building.
Lying on the davis table half naked, Preciado said that he feels relaxed and free to be himself while Davis paints an enzymatic paste on his scars.
“Places can be very candles with regard to skin care. I have the impression that these places tend to be quite critical,” said Preciado while his skin was starting to tighten in scale formations while the dough dry. “So, I like to be able to enter this place and have the impression of being taken care of – I am safe. She makes me back. “
Davis knows that the cost is always an obstacle for some people who want to receive its care services. Davis personalizes treatment plans for each person, and individual sessions are the visit of $ 300. She offers payment plans and has sometimes made a customer pay for the treatment of another person. In rare cases, it makes businesses instead of payment.
Leola Davis makes a treatment that she applied to the Emmett Preciado chest.
(Jireh Deng)
“I had a client who each time we worked on their acne, they were preparing a meal to me,” said Davis. “If I could do this job for free, I would absolutely do it. But being in this industry is very expensive. ”
Just as Davis presented himself for the community, he presented himself for her. After knee surgery last December, Davis had to take three months off and install a gofundme after his invalidity request was rejected. In less than a week, she was able to collect $ 10,000 to keep her business afloat.
Davis has large aspirations to continue to make his business a larger and more inclusive space beyond the walls of his current 100 square feet studio.
“My dream is to have a meda med where queer and trans people can go and do everything that is done,” said Davis. In her future space, she wants trans women to come for electrolysis for hair removal and trans men to obtain tattoos affirming sex for their chest scars. She wants a place where trans people “do not have to worry about people who do not know or do not want to treat them”.
In his work line, it is the relationships that continue to make his work significant and to feed his dreams. “I help heal people’s scars, but I also heal a deep part of myself,” said Davis.
While Davis works with his clients, they share secrets, life stories, joys and anxieties and she does not hold this confidence for acquired. She always remembers the first time that someone cried during treatment and she is kidding that she is also part -time therapist.
Davis said she was deeply gratitude that she was one of people’s trips to live their full and authentic life.
“Trans bodies are literally mean – let me touch you tenderly,” said Davis. “Having someone who touches you and loves you and who takes care of you as you are is really important … It is a necessary form of community, solidarity, support and care.”
