Aesthetics Etc.

Aesthetics Etc. owner Ann Marie Ray strives to transform standard beauty services into relaxing sensory experiences. Her staff incorporates the flame-softened wax of collagen-infused candles into select massages, relies on brand-name gloProfessional products, and encourages clients to slip into cozy slippers and robes. Ann Marie's signature service is permanent-makeup application though, which is useful both for helping chemotherapy patients to aesthetically recover from the loss of their eyebrows or simply shortening a client’s daily face-prepping routine.

Before pursuing a career in makeup and skincare, Ann Marie spent seven years working a standard 9-to-5 job in finance. After years of persuasion and encouragement from her mother, a professional aesthetician, she left the corporate world and became a certified permanent-cosmetics specialist in 2002. Today, mother and daughter operate separate but noncompeting businesses, referring clients to one another for specific treatments or a second opinion on who left the milk out that one time in 1991.