Beauty studio earns Marion's first body art permit

Clients have been asking Samantha Machado for months when she would be offering permanent makeup and microblading services. Now after months of working with the Marion Board of Health, Machado has obtained a town first — a body art permit that adds to Lash Love Beauty Studio’s repertoire.

“I have something here for everybody,” she said, sitting in her cozy studio between Front and Spring streets.

Lash Love Beauty Studio is the first Marion business to offer microblading and permanent makeup services. The Marion Board of Health confirmed that Machado, a Wareham resident, has gone through training for the services, some of which require tiny needles and ink.

Microblading is a procedure where an esthetician uses tiny blades to etch hair designs into a client’s eyebrows, meant to fill in sparse hairs. Then ink is applied into the skin, leaving behind better-shaped brows.

Clients can also schedule appointments for permanent makeup at Lash Love. Machado can help clients with permanent eyeliner and lip services, she said.

Some services include the use of a numbing cream, she said, as certain services include the use of needles.

As a skin specialist who’s also worked as a makeup educator for other companies, Machado said, she’s happy to answer clients' questions when they’re curious or confused about a service.

“I’m really big on education,” she said.

It’s OK when clients don’t know exactly what they want when they walk into her studio, Machado said, and sometimes, that can be more fun.

Machado has been an esthetician for 13 years and a makeup artist for 20 years. She had just gotten space to open her own studio at 368 Front St. when the pandemic began, so her new business became something of a quarantine project, she said. The beauty studio officially opened in July 2020.

She started her studio focusing on eyelash services: extensions, fills and lifts. When the pandemic was in full swing, working on someone’s eyelashes was one of the only services Machado could provide while clients came in wearing masks.

Clients came in wanting their eyelashes or brows done, she said, since that’s the only part of the face people saw of each other for so long.

“Everybody has been accentuating this as much as possible,” Machado said, gesturing to her own eye makeup.

Now that covid-19 restrictions are loosening, demand for other services, like makeup and spray-tanning, are rising.

Though the studio is small, accommodating one client at a time, it’s homey. One of the walls is blanketed with leaves and roses, while a pink neon sign on top reads “Be Savage Not Average.”

Machado said for many of the people she serves, her studio is their “peace and quiet.”

“They say it’s very enjoyable and comfortable coming in here,” she said. “They enjoy the atmosphere.”