Vogue’s Beauty and Wellness Editor on Every Viral Trend She’s Tried (And Which Ones Are Worth It)

0:00Hi, it's Sam Sussman. I'm the global director of Vogue Social. On Saturday night, I took to the streets of New York City to celebrate the Knicks winning with all the crowds. And it was a moment that I personally was heavily invested in, having grown up in New York. So I did watch the game, first from home, but at halftime I met up with Poupé, who was on assignment for us at Vogue to photograph all the joyous celebrations happening in New York City. Miraculously, we found each other because the service was bad in the West Village. There were multiple watch parties, but we went to Little Rubies where a very kind New Yorker was projecting the game onto the side of their building.

0:48There was thousands of people there and we managed to find a high vantage point and there was truly no better feeling and watching thousands of New Yorkers just react to every single basket and every single free throw. And it ended around 11.30 with a win for the Knicks. So the city erupted. I've never seen anything like this. Once the game ended, I mean, you could tell people were not going home anytime soon. So as I was walking around, the entire crowd started singing Empire State of Mind by Alicia Keys. I saw so many mixed couples making out everywhere, which was very fun. So Poupe and I were like, we cannot get enough of this.

1:34We're going to walk up to Madison Square Garden. We were weaving in between cars who were honking. The buses were honking. Sanitation trucks were honking. Everyone was dancing in the street. People had the craziest looks on. We ran into two cute gals who had their orange and blue wigs on, which was very cute. Fireworks in the street. If you just looked up at any point, you could see people on scaffolding. Everyone was sitting on top of cars and just screaming. It really was the most amazing night. When you went into the trains, everyone was screaming and jumping up and down. And it was peak euphoria, I would have to say.

2:22That's it for my sin report from the Knicks win on Saturday night. We'll be back after this commercial break.

2:38This week on Critics at Large, we're talking about Steven Spielberg and his blockbusters. Jaws. Jurassic Park. Of course, E.T. They're all classics for a reason. Does his latest Disclosure Day come close to those heights? There's a lot riding for the movie business on this question and for the culture sense of itself as large. Are movies still important? Are people going to the cinema still a thing? Are the youth like we were? All of those questions, those big cultural questions are coming up through Disclosure Day. Join me, Vincent Cunningham, and my co-hosts on Critics at Large. New episodes every Thursday, wherever you get your podcasts.

3:27this is the run through i'm chloing mal and today i am joined in the studio by our senior wellness and beauty editor margo ambuba margo welcome to the run through happy to be here as always you are somewhat of a regular on the run through but for our listeners who don't know can you introduce yourself and explain what a beauty and wellness editor does sure so i spend my day researching, sometimes actually trying whatever beauty trends you're seeing out there. And I get inspiration from the culture. That means like Netflix shows or even museums. If there's someone who paints hair very beautifully, that can also be like makeup trends people are trying.

4:05I'll report on those and anything celebrities are talking about. So I find that every week when I'm looking at our numbers, some of our best performing stories are what seem like to me sort of weird wellness stories. And I do feel like there is an unquenchable interest in the beauty and wellness space, particularly things to make your life better and your body healthier in terms of protein, fish oil, you name it, sardines. There's this thing called the alley cat diet, which is where you eat like an alley cat and it gives you better skin because of all the omegas and everything. Wait, what do alley cats eat besides fish, tinned fish?

4:48That was basically like the majority of the diet was tinned fish and rice. And there was like one other thing. Paper plates? Yeah. A little garbage. So, Margo, I go to a lot of end of year school events and these uptown moms are very focused on their health, beauty and wellness. And they're all talking about what peptides they are taking. When it comes to peptides, they and everyone will be happy to hear there's actually a peptide princess on the Upper East Side. Her name is Amanda Kahn. I just had my first appointment with her about three weeks ago. I like love an introductory doctor appointment.

5:29I feel like you can really, first of all, I talk about my favorite subject myself, and you really like get to dig in and see what a doctor is like. And this was the best appointment. It was an hour and a half. We went through my history. I talked to her about like how I'm feeling emotionally, how I'm feeling physically. And then she came back to me with this incredible list of peptides I could try. There was no pressure of being like. Is it like a menu? It sort of felt like a menu where she'd say, this is what this is for. And she categorized things by like would be nice, you could try and you may be interested in.

6:06And so like there is a peptide that helps your body produce more collagen. And collagen is something you need for your joints to feel good. It helps with your organs. It also makes your skin beautiful. It is the scaffolding basically of giving like plump skin. She put that in a you might be interested in. I was like, that is a must try for me. How are the peptides getting into your body? Is this injection or oral? Yes. You can inject. That is the preferred way of a lot of people because it bypasses your stomach. And your stomach is where a lot of things break down. And when it comes to supplements in general, probiotics, collagen, whatever, you are looking for something that can survive your stomach acid.

6:49So that's why people are turning to different forms. A lot of the ones she recommended were either injections or nasal. So just like your flow nays. Wow. Yes. Or there is a lot of other companies that do a liposomal one. What does that mean? Which is it comes in through your mouth. You hold it in your mouth under your tongue and it absorbs through your oral area. So that also bypasses and goes straight to the bloodstream. So what is your peptide stack? So I feel like the most sort of like hot topic, obviously, GLP-1s. The P in GLP-1 is peptide. I am going to be doing something. I want to say this is off-label for the record.

7:30So, like, I've had master Botox before. That is not approved by the FDA. People get that very frequently. I'm not interested in being the first person and trying something off-label, but if a lot of other people— Yeah, I don't want to be the last, though. So I will be micro-microdosing a GLP-1. There are promising studies that show that GLP-1s can help with inflammation across the body as well, especially at the micro-dose. So you're taking a microdose of GLP-1 as part of your peptide stack. Yes. Okay. That is part of, that's sort of like one part of the stack. Another one is this GHK peptide.

8:07And then there's something, all of these names are so crazy. CB4211, which is to help with energy. Something that Dr. Khan and I talked a lot about. I'm in my mid-30s. I have felt like a huge drop in physical energy. I did just start working out. I'm really sad to say the rumors are true. It feels great. Happy to hear it. But also, I just have had a lot of, I have a hard time getting out of bed. I have four alarms every morning. I slept through them for two hours this morning. Wow. Yeah, and they're in other rooms. I have to like get up and turn them off and I can do it in my sleep. Fondue must hate that.

8:43Yes, definitely. Fondue is my cat. And he and my partner both really hate it. So with Dr. Khan, something I really like is that there's a lot of like handholding. She is a concierge medicine doctor. Basically someone that you pay extra, usually not covered by insurance at all, to like hold your hand through the process. Right. So like if I got a paper cut, I could call my concierge doctor and be like, I have a paper cut. And they're sort of like doctor and therapist where they can tell you like you're being overly dramatic, but also on call to help you win. The peptide princess for the patient princess.

9:18Yes, exactly. That's a good one. Yes, I'm the patient princess. NAD, we have explored quite a bit on Vogue. There's a lot of different ways to take it, including intravenously. So you can get an NAD IV. NAD is one that you're supposed to feel a remarkable difference. Okay. When it comes to energy, it works on the mitochondria in your cells, so the powerhouse of all of your cells, to make you feel generally better, more energetic. For me, honestly, vitamin D and vitamin B, making sure that those levels are right makes a huge difference in my energy also. Okay, so I want to talk about that and then go back to peptides.

9:52But I just went to my doctor and her finding was that I am vitamin D deficient. And so then I just went to CVS to get a vitamin D supplement. But I was paralyzed because you told me that I need to make sure I get one that has another letter in it. And I couldn't remember what letter that was and what to do. Totally. So there are different vitamins that work synergistically together to help with absorption. Vitamin D and vitamin K should always be paired together because that makes sure that you're absorbing it better, but also that the vitamin D is going to the places that you need it, like your bones.

10:27Once again, that number 30 is sort of the time when our whole body changes. Okay. And you have the highest bone density you'll ever have in your life at 30. From there, downhill, baby. And vitamin D helps with bone density. Yes. And so that's something that strength training also helps with. And so I think that something that is very intimidating about the supplement space is that there's not a lot of regulation. Well, so I had lunch with a frequent Vogue model, someone who's in our pages all the time, who we trust and love. And in the middle of lunch, she brought out her full tray of supplements that she takes before every meal.

11:04and I was intrigued and I was like, if she's taking those supplements, is she then not taking peptides? Like, do they preclude each other? They definitely don't preclude each other. Like, one of the supplements I'm really big on is a fiber supplement. There is no way to get a fiber peptide. Okay. And so you can take... Basically, you need a princess to explain all this to you. Yes. I love a princess to explain it to me. You just love a princess. Yeah, so true. For the Vogue readers who can't have the princess, I'm here to answer your questions or help you figure out the answer to them. From princess to peasant.

11:41I would never call the folk readers peasants. How dare you? So there are supplements that cannot be peptides, cannot be liposomes. Fiber is the one that really comes to mind because, like, you need that grit that's going through your digestive system. Will you be writing about this on your weekly newsletter? Yes. I will be writing all about my peptide journey on my Sunday newsletter. I tried that, and that was Chloe's idea of a name. It's so fun because frequently she'll come to me with a question and say, what's the deal with this? What's the deal with that? And I'll say, oh, I tried that, and here's what the experience was like.

12:15It's true. We all need Margo to be our guinea pig. I know. I am, I think, sometimes too game to try something, but it's a lot of fun. One could argue. One could argue. It's a hazard of the job, I suppose. Speaking of things you've tried, I want to know about Emsculpt. And what it is. Okay. This is not a new technology, but I am quite obsessed with it. I, you know, I'm in my workout journey. I've never had abs in my life. Like, no definition, whatever. I was talking to someone and they suggested I try Emsculpt. The cool thing about Emsculpt is it happens in a doctor's office. They put this giant plate on whatever body part you want.

12:54I tried it on my abdomen, but there's arm ones, there's legs, there's butt. and what it does is it shocks your muscles and has them contract. So I did like 20 ,000 crunches in the time of 30 minutes. Wait, is that different than EMS? Yes. So EMS is a low level. It doesn't go very deep into the muscle and it helps you deeper contract the muscle fiber while you're working out. EMS has come a long way since I first tried it when I was at Goop and they like hosed me down in the corner of a gym because you do have to be damp to do this workout. Gross. And made me then like put on all this device and they would shock you when you're in the deepest part of whatever you're contracting.

13:33So when your butt's all the way down, when you're lifting your bicep at the peak of height, they help you deeper contract. This is doing everything for you. You lay there prone and it does the workout for you. It is sort of like black mirror-ish in a way. Oh, it's weird. I don't like it. What does it feel like? Okay, I have videos of myself. The way that it works is sort of like in a wave. So it's not like EMS where it goes through sort of waves of intense contraction. I mean, it feels like you're like buzzing with shock treatment. Yeah, like you did a full crunch in the heart with 20 pounds of weight on your shoulders or something.

14:11EMS, the workout, which stands for electrical muscle stimulation, and it basically makes you look like Laura Croft. You sort of tape on all these electrodes. And then when you are doing a typical workout, it is further contracting your muscles with this vibrating stimulation as you're doing it. But that just feels like a sort of a wave of intense vibrations. It almost feels like I have a Theragun that I use on my leg muscles, and it feels like a version of that. But this, it sounds like it's totally different. I started out around – they, like, warm you up during the 30-minute session. So it starts out around 20.

14:48And then your practitioner will start to be like, okay, can you go a little higher? I made it up on my first session all the way to 100, but only for the last like three minutes. That was, I could not have done 100 all the way through. I go about like at 80 % max where it's still, I have to give a deep breath. It's not comfortable, but it's not painful. I walk out of there. First of all, they're like, the first time I go, they're like, you won't be sweaty at all. I was so sweaty sitting there in my, like, vintage 1940s dress. Sweating. The people's princess. Yeah, sweating uncontrollably. They took the device off of my stomach, sweat dripping down it.

15:26I was, like, so embarrassed. The woman was like, wow. And, like, yeah, it worked out a lot. Second time, not as bad. I think that they said that that's typically what they see because you're used to it. They recommend four sessions and that it can actually— What price point are we talking here? $800 typically a session. Yes. Oh, wow. So it is expensive. To me, it sort of feels like... Priceless abs. To me, it sort of feels like the add-on once you've done so much work at the gym and you feel like you're stuck at a point. Like, I feel like a lot of people when they're exercising plateau or they feel like they're plateauing, whether it comes to cardio or weightlifting, they can't quite get their tricep where they want it.

16:08And this is sort of like an assist. Okay. On the topic of sculpting, what is buckle massage? I feel like you've been talking about this for a few years. Yes. I had my girl, Riley Welch, come. She does it at home for me now on my bed. Oh, my God. Fondue was sitting there purring while I'm getting this face massage. Does he get buckle massage? No, but she was like, I feel like he wants me to pet him also. And I was like, not when you have your hand in my mouth. Like, but a buckle. Verbal central. Truly. So your buckle area is the area right below the cheek, sort of the mid face down. A couple years ago, we saw everyone was removing this pocket of fat right here to give you sort of like a very sculpted, like you're sucking in your cheeks look.

16:51Got it. It felt very hollow. Yes. I don't like that look. Yeah. I don't want to look like an era because I like vintage clothing. Last year, I was working on this story about how actors are abstaining from getting plastic surgery or even just injectables, whether it's Botox or filler, because they are in a period piece. And someone from the 1800s would not have filled lips, would not have that keyhole look, would not maybe have those high cheekbones. Spooky. Yes. And Amanda Seyfried, who was on our cover, actually spoke about it for The Testament of Ann Lee in an interview. That was sort of the hook.

17:29It was really interesting. And I was talking to my partner. She said she didn't get Botox. She said she did not get anything for a full year before they started filming because she needed to emote. And, you know, this person would have wrinkles in the, you know, in the shaker community. And so I was asking my partner, who is sort of pop culture obtuse, and he told me that he thinks the reason that, like, I don't look in a 2000s face, an Instagram face, a modern face, is because I have all this buckle fat. Oh, interesting. And that sort of is the hallmark of our modern age is like a really hollowed face and cheekbone is one of them.

18:06So this massage helps minimize? It can help with lymphatic drainage. So if you're feeling a little puffy, it can also help with stretching the muscles. So I've been on this very, very long-winded attempt to stop clenching my jaw. I do it at work. I do it when I'm asleep. I do it all the time. I have started putting my tongue in between my teeth when I'm just sitting there because you will not, like your brain won't let you bite down on your tongue unless you do it intentionally. And so that's a way for me to stop clenching my jaw all the time. But the buckle massage really helps with that. It helps stretch out the muscle.

18:43It's basically yoga for the bottom half of your face. And if you've ever like done gua sha and heard crackling somewhere, like I heard a lot on my chin, that's that my fascia is really tight. Yeah. And I'm trying to break it up. Ugh. Yeah. So I'm trying to fight the good fight at home, but sometimes you need to bring someone else in. It started with I was getting masseter Botox, so Botox in this muscle. Okay. And it would paralyze it temporarily, shrink it, so it wouldn't be as strong. But you do have to get that like every six months. So now I'm sleeping with a retainer, doing face massage every day, and trying acupuncture.

19:17I am like throwing everything at the wall. Yes. I wear a retainer every night for? Grinding your teeth also. It's not cute, but it's nice. Yeah. Yeah. No, it's very important. You recently did scalp injections with RADS or biostimulating molecules. What does that mean? Is that actually scalp Botox? And why does your scalp need Botox? So this is not scalp Botox at all. Lauren Goodman is a injector from LA. She was visiting and I went to this really chic room in the Hotel Chelsea where she sort of talked to me about how the scalp is a way to do a lot of lifting, a lot of work without showing anything on the face.

20:00I feel like one of the things we notice when people step out with a new facelift is like you can see how tight it is. And usually there's like a scar. There's a mark somewhere that sort of shows. She was telling me that by applying certain like biostimulating molecules and what those are is they are different than a filler or a Botox. They help your body attract a natural component to the area that they are in. So like she put them, she calls it a crown lift. So basically, if you imagine where a crown would go, she took a cannula and inserted it right on my temple. And then she went up into my scalp and applied it at different points.

20:46The cannula went up through your scalp? Went up under. I have to say, I do not normally numb because I want to understand what the experience is. I am so relieved I numbed. And I watched my friend, Audrey, who a friend of Vogue, amazing writer, get it after me. We went on a little friend date and got this treatment done together. I would not have been able to do it if I had watched her go first. Yikes. I could hear it both outside and inside my head, the injections, but it hurt. It was like a six out of 10. It definitely, when I bonked it, I could feel it when I brushed my hair, whatever. But it went away and very chicly, Lauren sent us home with a little bag that had two Tylenol in little like branded bags.

21:29And I was like, oh, this is such a fab, like chic touch for this treatment. Wow. I guess it is looking sort of tight over there on your temples. Thank you so much. I'm curious to see it really develops over a couple of months because the biostimulating molecules are still in there. But now my body is going to start attracting calcium, collagen, things like that to those areas. Wow. So it will just continue to get better. Once a year. Okay. And how much would that cost? I think it costs around$3 ,000. Okay. But honestly, a facelift, a good facelift is very expensive. Not saying that I— So this is a steal.

22:06Yeah, so this is a steal. A scalp steal. Also, I don't need a facelift at 35. What I would like is a little bit of a lift. And I am not interested right now in getting like a blepharoplasty, which is an eye lift. We've been seeing people get these a ton. It was like trending term last year. It's still going strong. And you can either do an upper or a lower or both sometimes. And some people have to medically get them. Like my little brother has had to get them because we have droopy eyelids, pitosis, run in the family. And he can't drive. So he has had like medically covered eye lifts. Wow. But a lot of people want them to look more awake.

22:46The run through will be back in a moment.

22:57Hi, this is Bella Freud. Each week on Fashion Neurosis, I interview highly creative people in the world of fashion, film, art, sport, literature and music. The format of the show is that my guest lies on the couch and I sit in a chair like an analyst. I know. I ask questions, quite simple things that revolve around how we reveal or hide things through what we wear. How we do or don't draw attention to ourselves. Find Fashion Neurosis on YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts.

23:43Margot, I want to hear about your sleep hygiene at the moment, because I was very into your article about how the astronauts recovered their sleep score after they landed back on Earth. and I feel like I've been really trying to focus on getting a crown on my aura ring for my sleep. Are you comfortable with telling me what your score was last night? Yes, that's a great question. I feel like it's sort of revealing when you talk to people about their sleep score. Sleep champion. Oh, 85 sleep score. Crown, you were efficient. Your sleep efficiency was optimal. Looks like you're doing a good job at dedicating your bed for sleeping.

24:25Seven hours and 24 minutes. Nice. Okay. I got a 76 last night, so slightly under you. My recent sleep hygiene breakthrough or change is I am putting my phone in the kitchen before I go to sleep. Wow. What's your alarm clock situation then? Okay. I mean, I can sleep through anything. I am, like, very hard to wake up. Do you have the thing that shakes your bed? Yes. Oh! So I have an Eight Sleep, which both shakes my bed and drops the temperature. Oh, my God. But what I find is then I just like sort of lay on my arms on my stomach to stay warm. Wow. That does not wake me up. So the Eight Sleep is a mattress cover.

25:05There's a couple different iterations of it. It's a mattress cover that can do a lot of things. So people who are going through menopause and getting night sweats or things like that, it can change the temperature of your bed through a water system. It pumps water through and either heats it or cools it. So my bed vibrates. It gets very cold. Next to me, I have the hatch alarm. My children do too. I basically am one of your children. It is the alarm that does like a sunrise alarm. So it gets gradually brighter until it's a really light, bright lamp, basically, when your alarm is going off. I have that so that like I can't really escape it.