After making headlines thanks to one Kim Kardashian, the A-list facialist Keren Bartov talks about the golden advice she took from her good friend Gal Gadot and the surprising $2 million gift she received
When she just set off, her parents asked her to keep her job secret, and to this day her English is not fluent, but none of these prevented the renowned aesthetician, Keren Bartov from becoming the woman responsible for the skin care of some of the most beautiful and famous faces in the world – from Jennifer Lopez to Lily Collins. After making the headlines thanks to one, Kim Kardashian, she talks about the golden advice she took from her good friend Gal Gadot and the surprising $2 million gift she received
Last month, Kim Kardashian caused a stir on the network, when she shared a snapshot on Instagram with cosmetic entrepreneur Keren Bartov who had just made her skin smooth and glowing.
(Photo: from Instagram)
Later Kim shared another story in which she advertised the line of skincare products bearing the name of that facial revitalizer: Keren Bartov. The 360 million followers of one of the most influential women in the world were exposed to the Israeli facialist, who was sure that this visit would remain confidential.
This is a really good story for the children and the shocked clientele in Israel. However one cannot argue with the fact that the value of such an advertisement is estimated at over two million dollars. Not including VAT, I guess.
“I was at Kim’s house in Los Angeles and she was very satisfied with the facial treatment, telling me that it was the best she has ever experienced, recalls Bartov from her Israeli clinic located in Tel Aviv. “I saw her taking pictures of the products, asking also for a selfie with me; I thought it was for her to keep. I went to bed after spending a long day at work which started early in the morning, and suddenly I received an overwhelming number of messages on my phone, ‘Keren, wake up, Kim Kardashian tagged you’.
This has never happened to me before, not even on my wedding day. Everyone I know, people that I haven’t seen in 20 years texted to congratulate me; tens of thousands of followers complimented me, saying I was ‘an inspiration’, and ‘amazing’ and that ‘I made them cry, seeing an Israeli who has come this far, especially today. People said they wanted to book a treatment. It was a huge thing for me. I haven’t seen Kim tagging a facialist before.
My heart was palpitating before I got to Kim Kardashian’s, but as soon as I entered her house, I acted very professionally. There is no room for mistakes, and even if I am excited, I say it out loud, to break the ice. Kim is very, very beautiful, kind, agreeable, very simple, behaving like an ordinary, regular person.”
It’s pretty crazy. She is a very influential woman. “Yes, it’s crazy. I’m speechless, I never imagined this would happen; I treat a lot of Hollywood stars, and I never ask them to tag me, there’s nothing more embarrassing than that. They may do that when they’re very satisfied, or after undergoing several treatments and are happy with the results on their skin, which made them appreciate the treatments and products and wanted to spread the word. But I wouldn’t ask for it, there’s no way I’ll ask someone to share a post on social media about me.”
Did you write to her afterward? “I wrote her ‘Oh my God, I can’t believe it, thank you!’ I don’t really know how to speak English, I took a course and it wasn’t helpful. But I didn’t let this obstacle stop me. She replied, ‘You deserve it’.”
How did you get to her in the first place? “Her personal assistant wrote to me. It is very common In L.A. to provide facial treatment at the client’s house, because they usually have the bed and some of them also have the devices. I bring my products, so there’s no problem. These are people who really have everything.
My heart was palpitating before I got there, but as soon as I entered Kim’s house, I acted very professionally. There is no room for mistakes, and even if I am excited, I say it out loud, to break the ice. Kim is very, very beautiful, kind, agreeable, very simple, behaving like an ordinary, regular person.”
So she has blackheads on her nose? “She’s perfect. There’s a reason why these women become stars, they have a halo above their head.”
Didn’t you pay her to share the story on Instagram? “If I had two million dollars I would probably be in Thailand now. I can’t explain how it happened. I still don’t believe it. These people are unable to be reached, and I literally touch them. What are the chances it would happen to Keren from the southern city of Be’er Sheva?”
At Paris Hilton’s party
But it did happen. The 46-year-old Bartov, married and a mother of three, is currently the woman who treats the faces of the most famous women in the world, including Julia Roberts, Demi Moore, Jennifer Lopez, Kate Moss, Selena Gomez, Cindy Crawford, Lily Collins, Paris Hilton, Goldie Hawn, Kirsten Dunst and also Gal Gadot, one of her long-time clients from Israel.
Bartov started off more than a decade ago, in a small clinic located in a small town in Israel, with Gal Gadot being a loyal client. Over the years she’s amassed an impressive clientele which led her to open a larger clinic in Tel Aviv, containing six treatment rooms where she works in parallel with her team of trained Aestheticians.
After an hour of using various different machines to target the skin issues, the customers leave with glowing skin that is ready for a close-up.
A year and a half ago, Bartov launched a clinic in Notting Hill London. And just like in the movie, Julia Roberts walked in. Bartov doesn’t get confused. “I don’t mind who walks inside, it can be a celebrity, a doctor, a lawyer. It doesn’t matter. I have to give my best and not be distracted. And no, I don’t let it affect me while I’m treating.”
How do you break the ice in such encounters? “I say, ‘I’m very glad you’re here’. Frankly, it’s everyone’s dream to meet with these people, so I say the first thing that comes to mind.”
“I’m just a girl, standing in front of a boy, asking him to love her.” “No way! It would make me sound like a groupie.”
But it’s very natural. You meet them in quite an intimate situation, without makeup, standing really close to them. Is there no embarrassment involved? “No, because I know how to get over the embarrassment. There is excitement, certainly at the beginning; I felt it when I started treating celebrities in Israel. My first renowned clients were Hila Nachshon and Shiri Maimon, and my hands were shaking. I saw Shiri parking her car and I took deep breaths, but when she entered the room I played it cool, although deep inside I felt breathless. I admired her.”
Do these treatments lead to friendship? “In Israel, obviously, but also abroad, because the treatments are very intimate, we maintain very private conversations despite my poor English. So yes, it connects. I also have friends there who would invite me to their events; I’ve just been to Paris Hilton’s party, for example. They can come to me after having a really bad day, just waiting for someone to pour their heart out to, and they confide in me. They know I’m there for them, so they share; we enter each other’s hearts.”
Do these A-lists pay? “They all pay.”
Did Kim pay? “Yes, she did.”
Did Julia Roberts take out her credit card? “Yes. With a card with the name ‘Julia Roberts’ imprinted on it.”
So there is no ‘give and take’? “No. They receive treatment. They would tell me, ‘I have never experienced such a treatment’.”
It’s a real compliment. “I admit that I don’t get it. They’ve tried everything, and eventually, I, Keren from Israel, gave them the best treatment? It’s inconceivable. But I know that I’m working very hard, and I’m always looking for the next thing, the next machine; both in Israel and in London, somehow I’m always the first to bring the most advanced machines, and then it starts to spread and becomes common. In the end, the greatest satisfaction is not treating this or that A-list, but it’s rather helping people with skin problems, regardless of who they are.”
And as a very successful Israeli, working abroad at a time when not everyone likes to disclose their connection to Israel or to Israelis, do you feel that you need to hide your Israeli identity? “Absolutely not. I’m not hiding. I upload stories on social media about the situation, about the hostages, about the war. I am so proud of my country, I will never conceal my identity.”
Were there any consequences involved in this decision? “Some wrote to me, ‘You are murderers,’ ‘We will confiscate your land.’ There were also clients who left, but there were also non-Jewish clients who came to me specifically to express their support, saying that they wanted to book a treatment to support an Israeli business. They see reality as it is.”
Were there demonstrations in front of your clinic in London? “No, but I’m afraid, it’s unpleasant. However, I’m not going to hide my being Israeli. Even if I wanted to, my non-native English accent would give me away. They know that I’m Keren from the bloc.”
To what extent does being around these world’s influential women require you to engage in hasbara (advocacy)? “To a great extent; I’m not afraid to express my opinion, even though their opinion is different than mine. I was able to exert my influence on some women, but I can’t influence them all.”
How much do these Hollywood stars ask about the situation? “A lot. I won’t share names because what is said in the room stays in the room, but a lot of them are very much interested. I won’t treat stars who are purely pro-Palestinian; this will never happen. You can’t come to me for treatment while deep inside you want to exterminate me.
I will be more than happy to treat girls who hold a more complex opinion. For example, there are clients who post stories about the children in Gaza. I can understand that; they don’t live in Israel, they don’t understand what’s going on; what else, the media abroad doesn’t always cover Israeli news. So I feel it’s a big mission to show our side of the story as well. Very often I show them video clips of the October 7 massacre, saying, ‘You don’t get it, we didn’t start the war’.”
So you apply active ingredients while providing hasbara. “Yes, I’m happy to do it and I also know how to do it, without pressure. If I see that someone feels uncomfortable and things get awkward, then I build the relationship step by step, and maybe on the next or the third treatment we could talk about it. There were girls who deleted an Instagram story featuring ‘Free Palestine’ because of me. I wrote to them at length, despite my poor English, and they took down their Instagram story to respect me.”
What does it do to you, shifting from the Israeli reality to this glamorous life? “It makes me jealous. I keep asking myself, ‘how come all they can think of is which restaurant to go to and which dress to wear, and all we do is suffer?’ And it strikes me every time I’m abroad, seeing the luxury, the restaurants, their evenings out, the evening gowns and the bags; I would say ‘how lucky they are to engage in all these insignificant things, they are so fortunate. Why only we have to endure sadness?’ I think about it every day. They don’t understand us, and will never do, unless they live in Israel; therefore we cannot judge them. They don’t understand because they see only one side of the picture.”
Spending one week every month in London
She was born in the northern city of Be’er Sheva, a middle child of three sisters. She had known what a freelance job meant since she was a child. “My parents owned clothing stores in Be’er Sheva and Arad (in the south), and they kept warning me, ‘don’t ever be a freelancer, it’s tough’. To this day my parents work very hard. They still own a clothing store in central Israel. I kept saying to myself that I wouldn’t work as freelancer, because I’ve seen its ups and downs and the risks it involved. But somehow it happened.”
Just before it happened, Bartov tried her luck as a play-actress. “My biggest dream was to become an actress. I studied acting for three years at Beit Zvi School of the Performing Arts. When I graduated, I went to an audition, where I saw hundreds of girls more beautiful and successful than I was, and I said, ‘Bye Keren, go home, this is not for you’. I was very insecure at the time. When you finish acting school you feel worn out, because you always have to deal with harsh and critical reviews. I’m really proud of myself for not going nuts there.”
“So when acting didn’t work out for me I went to engage in my second favorite thing: cosmetics. I’ve loved it from the day I was born. When I was in second grade I would steal creams from my mother and sell them to neighbors; poor thing, every week she would fire another housekeeper.”
At the age of 28, she met Roy, then an army man and now a businessman, and the two moved into a small house in the south, which included two rooms she would use for facial treatment. Her three children, who are now 16, 15 and 11 years old, were born there. “For two years I kept it secret,” she recalls. I remember my mother asking me not to disclose that I engaged in cosmetics.
Why? “Because back then it was considered a profession for people who failed in school, although it wasn’t true, as there were well-educated girls who took cosmetics with me. It’s an amazing profession, which is highly valued today. For me, cosmetics is like medicine. In order to become a professional facialist you have to learn about the skin like a doctor. After all, a facialist does much more than removing blackheads.”
At the age of 29, when she felt she was engaging in a profession that was right for her, Bartov managed to rise to success. “Within two months, my schedule was fully booked. My advertisement has been word-of-mouth. After spending eight years in the south, we moved to the city of Kadima, located in the center of Israel, to fulfill my dream, treating the local mega-star Shiri Maimon.
(Photo: Raz Gross)
You didn’t know each other. “No. Her aunt came for treatment, and at her recommendation, Shiri also came.”
Among her first customers in Kadima, there was also one, Gal Gadot. “She is one of a kind, a client who turned into a friend. During the COVID pandemic, I decided to fulfill my life-long dream to set up a clinic overseas, and I had already started the procedure with Los Angeles – regulations, getting approvals for products, etc.
One day Gal came for treatment in Tel Aviv. I told her that I was planning to go to L.A., and she advised me to try London instead; it’s the center of the world, it’s a four-hour flight from Israel, and the procedure to set up a business there is easier. I went home, asking my husband to halt the procedure with L.A. which started six months earlier. I took Gal’s advice, and thanks to her I opened the London clinic.”
(Photo: From Instagram)
It’s a courageous step. “Yes, and it requires taking loans as well, but life is short and I think that we, women, need to fulfill ourselves. There were people who had doubts, my father, for example, told me ‘Don’t do that, I won’t let you risk everything you’ve built so far’. But I told him ‘You’ll see that I’ll make it, nothing can stop me.’
After a year I started receiving requests from my famous clients in London to come and take care of them ahead of the Golden Globe Awards. I informed Gal that I was coming, and she told me without hesitating, ‘Give me the dates. I’m texting my friends, they must know you’.” She texted her mega-star friends, and that’s how Isla Fisher, Natalie Portman and Kristen Wiig became her clients.
I see changes in the skin of Israeli women this past year. They suffer from sudden acne outbreaks or spots. Stress and sadness negatively affect the skin, and this year we definitely see an increase in skin problems.
So what does your schedule look like today? “I have a team of highly trained aestheticians in London that take care of them all. I spend one week every month at the clinic in London, and before every award ceremony I fly to take care of my client actresses. I’ve just been there, for the Emmy Awards. The rest of the time I’m at the clinic in Tel Aviv, and even when I’m not there I know what’s going on in every single treatment room.”
Do you plan to open a clinic in Los Angeles? “Sure. And it will happen soon.”
Does your career affect your personal life? “Sure. When I worked in Kadima, the children knew that I finished work at 2 p.m. to prepare their lunch. It’s funny, the first treatment I gave to Gal Gadot was at noon, and I invited her to eat schnitzels with us.
When I started the clinic in Tel Aviv, I was no longer at home by 2, but still, I waited for my children to grow up a bit so I could also fulfill myself. But I always struggle with feelings of guilt. I went from being a totally devoted mom to a mom who disappears for a week once a month, or for two weeks when I’m in Los Angeles. I used to be a mother who never flew without the children, I never used the services of a babysitter.”
Do you get comments from your children? “Many times they are upset when I travel, asking ‘why are you going again?’ I reply that ‘mom is going to fulfill her dream, and when you grow up you will also want to fulfill your dreams’. So, on the one hand they are very proud of me, but on the other hand, they miss me. But my husband helps and is very supportive of me.”
Does he allow you to take out blackheads from his face? After all, this is what we like to do, even though we are not facialists. “He won’t let me. It is painful!”
Didn’t your husband undergo treatment by Keren Bartov?! “No. Neither have my sisters. I don’t have time, they get treatment from my staff from time to time.”
Let’s face it, it’s not cheap. Not the facial treatment, nor the products. “It’s all relative. A facial cream or acid is priced at $100-150, and because my ingredients are highly concentrated, all you need is apply one drop. I know that when you see the price you say, ‘It’s expensive,’ but you should take into consideration that you use the product for five to six months. You don’t need to cover yourself with cream to see results.”
Do you see changes in the skin of Israeli women this past year? “Yes, of course. They suffer from sudden acne outbreaks or spots. Stress and sadness negatively affect the skin, and this year we definitely see an increase in skin problems. We take care of families of hostages and hostages who have returned from captivity. It’s heartbreaking. You understand that after all that we’ve been through, everything is just nonsense.”
Now that you’re working also overseas, does the thought of leaving Israel pass through your mind? “No way. I have three sons, my eldest loves the army. Now it’s our time to contribute our share to the country. I am extremely worried, but there’s nothing I can do. He wants to have a military career like his father. There is no way I will leave. In the end, Israel is my country, this is where my family lives. I love being here. There’s no place like home.”
As reported by Ynetnews