“If you don’t already know this name, you will.” A mutual contact tells of me Inge Theron. And I did know of her. The founder of FACEGYM has built an empire that extends far beyond facial fitness, creating experiences that blur the lines between luxury, science, biohacking, and genuine transformation. Despite her unmissable personality (a great one) and presence, Theron is quietly revolutionizing how the industry thinks about wellness, beauty, and the spaces in-between. But her journey to wellness royalty began in the most unlikely place: the skeptical world of journalism.

“When I was 18 years old, I came to London and had no family to rely on. I literally had, like, a couple of hundred quid left.” Those early struggles have likely shaped everything that followed, including Theron’s relentless work ethic and refusal to accept the status quo. As the “Spa Junkie” columnist for the Financial Times’ How to Spend It, she would later go on to test over 500 treatments across the globe, armed with a journalism mantra that would prove prophetic.

“The Spa Junkie column was more than a byline — it was a front-row seat to a global industry in its infancy,” Theron explains. “I wasn’t just writing reviews; I was witnessing the beginnings of what we like to call the Longevity Revolution.” That obsessive curiosity and rigorous fact-checking approach became her secret weapon (Gillian de Bono, her Financial Times editor, had famously told her to “never trust anyone”), ensuring everything she creates is science-backed. “With so much snake oil in my industry,” she notes, referring to the wellness world’s credibility crisis back then, which one could argue still stands true today.