Beauty
INSPIRATION ACCORDING TO SUZI WEISS
She, the inspirer of OPI, should know
Last Tuesday, I was incredibly busy with my nails. I painted my nails neatly and colorfully and gave my hands just a little extra dab of cream. It's not like my interview candidate Suzi Weiss, founder of OPI, would catch me with unkempt, unpainted nails. Of course, I didn't catch her with worn-out polish either, because as the best and prettiest business card of the brand, I think that's the first thing you do in a day.
Alright, enough about the polish, I was curious about Suzi's inspiration. If you have a brand with the most beautiful and numerous colors AND the funniest names, then I am incredibly curious about where all that inspiration comes from. Was she going to tell me.
Inspiration from the past
“I grew up in Hungary until I was ten, and I remember that I was always busy with my mother's nails. I was always looking at her color, and I found that very special. After that, I really developed a love for fashion and of course also for beauty, but also for interior design. I was always moving or changing things in the house. So my love is not only related to beauty but certainly also to decorating and interiors. But ultimately, it all has to do with beauty.”
Home and wardrobe
“I have many accent colors in my house, because I often change cushions or art. My clothing, on the other hand, is almost always black. I am so busy with colors in nail polish that I like to keep my wardrobe more natural. In accessories like shoes, jewelry, and of course nail polish, I vary a lot. You can really make a statement with it, and you also get new inspiration from it.”
“I grew up in Hungary until I was ten, and I remember that I was always busy with my mother's nails.”
Have you caught the travel-addiction virus? Many OPI collections are inspired by different cities.
“When we started in 1989, we looked at other nail polish brands, and the names for those colors were just not personal at all. They were just numbers on a bottle indicating the color. We really wanted to change that. Nail polish had to be fun, and a woman had to really connect with it. By letting ourselves be inspired by different travels, we really let women travel the world. You don't necessarily have to go there yourself (although that would be very nice), but with OPI nail polish, you travel the whole world. Quality comes first, but the personal touch is very important, and we also try to achieve that through the names. That inspires us, and it actually inspires everyone. It really fits the current generation, and the names are just well remembered.”
And then the colors. How do you translate the feeling of a city into a bottle?
“I always look at trend reports from Paris and Milan, developments in beauty, packaging materials, and fashion. You need all of that together to determine a color. I look very much at a place and the general inspiration you can draw from there. You have to be able to breathe the atmosphere.”
OPI is known for the creative names on the polishes. It gives us a huge smile on our faces even before we have painted our nails. But how, please tell us how you manage to do that every time.
“You say it well: it's ‘you’. There is a fantastic team of six people. The colors I determine myself, but we come up with the names together. Someone from marketing, someone from the creative department, someone from customer service, from sales and purchasing, etc. We sit together in a room, of course, looking at the theme and diving into a huge stack of books. And then, it's just a matter of playing with words. We look at specific items within the city. If you're talking about Switzerland, then there must be something in it about watches or clocks. Or skiing. And there is always something about food. We just really love food.”
