La Bella Figura Co-Founders Make Their Next Moves As The Trailblazing Beauty Brand Ends

La Bella Figura co-founder Victoria Fantauzzi is shutting down her trailblazing beauty brand, but she’s not leaving beauty totally behind. 

Fantauzzi is opening the store Recuerdos Shop at a location in Chicago’s Lincoln Square neighborhood where La Bella Figura currently has a storefront. Fashioned after chic gift shops situated in boutique hotels around the world, the store will carry artisanal finds handpicked by Fantauzzi, who discovered them during her global travels. Luxury soap brand Orris Paris and Oaxacan chocolate maker Casa Bosques will be available at Recuerdos Shop, which opens on Nov. 19. 

“It’s all stuff that I love that I’m bringing into the shop, but I want to do it in a connected way because they all have these incredible stories,” says Fantauzzi. “I want to give customers online and here that experience of discovering beautiful things.”

Karen King, Fantauzzi’s co-founder at La Bella Figura, has moved on from the beauty industry to a design firm. Still brimming with a passion for skincare formulation, Fantauzzi, also founder of event program A Night For Green Beauty, will introduce a house skincare brand for Recuerdos Shop called Casa Brava by Victoria. It will have limited-edition product “drops” every month. 

Fantauzzi is planning to collaborate with brands carried at Recuerdos Shop such as Casa Bosques. A collaboration with Paris-based artist and photographer Jamie Beck, who previously worked with La Bella Figura, is in the pipeline for early 2023, too. 

Established a dozen years ago, La Bella Figura gained a cult following with its carefully crafted skincare, haircare, body care and fragrance products using plant-based ingredients like barbary fig seed and blue tansy oils. Over time, its selection grew to 45 products priced from $40 to $175, with most offerings topping the $100 mark. The brand’s bestsellers include $115 Découverte Under Eye Repair Serum and $135 Modern Radiance Concentrate. Starting Friday, La Bella Figura will hold a closeout sale. 

The stress and challenges of the last 2-plus years have caused many smaller brands to reassess their operations and ultimately chose to close their doors. Just this week, Priya Apotheca, Fluide and Vesca announced they’ll be going out of business. La Bella Figura experienced a sales bump online at the beginning of the pandemic as consumers flocked to e-commerce, but its retail sales suffered. 

The brand always kept tight reins on retail distribution. Pre-pandemic, it was carried by clean beauty retailer Follain, online clean beauty destination Integrity Botanicals, a few international retailers like Beautysaur in Hong Kong, and more niche retail players. In January 2021, La Bella Figura decided to stop retail distribution and stick to a direct-to-consumer model.  

“I had a phone call with one of our oldest retailers and they were like, ‘The products are not selling,’” says Fantauzzi. “I was like, ‘You’re not selling the products. On our end we’re selling, and you’re not watching what we’re doing. We’re talking to our customers in a much different way than you guys are doing. We’re in a partnership, so we’re not going to work for you. We’re going to end this relationship.’ And then I was like, let’s end them all.”

Fantauzzi admits she was nervous committing to DTC, but it paid off. La Bella Figura’s DTC sales climbed 60%. The brand focused on its strength of creating artisanal products and developed a House Curation collection of them, notably a rose face oil in partnership with Beck. The oil drew new customers to La Bella Figura. Fantauzzi reports, “We had like 500 units and sold out in hours.” 

The success of the face oil wasn’t a savior for La Bella Figura, however. Fantauzzi and King began discussing possible next steps, including securing an investor or entering a major retailer like Nordstrom. They opted not to pull the trigger on either. La Bella Figura’s 2022 sales weren’t as strong as its 2021, and the co-founders decided in October that they would close the brand.