About Us

Before she was Mary show: successful investment banker, and Media icon, Mary Magdalene Debessai Asefaw was a little girl in Asmara transfixed by her mother’s hairdresser and beauty shop. As MARY MAGDALENE always says, her mother, a Certified beauty beautician always taught her that, like our bodies, our skin needs feeding with healthy, nourishing, and, most importantly, natural ingredients. This has a great impact on each and every product created at DESTA BEAUTY and DESTA SKIN.

The multiple award winner creator first time experienced makeup, organic skincare routings, and hair care for herself, she never looked back. Makeup and skincare routing became her weapon of choice for self-expression—a way to radiate her ever-changing mood—and it powered a fearless take on beauty that helped her become the boundary-breaking Media and talk show icon she is today.

Mary Magdalene was inspired to create Desta Beauty after years of experimenting with the best-of-the-best in beauty—and still seeing a void in the industry for products that performed across all skin types and tones. She launched a skincare and makeup line “so that people everywhere would be included,” focusing on a wide range of traditionally hard-to-match skin tones, creating formulas that work for all skin types, and pinpointing universal shades.

Desta Beauty products are designed to enhance feel lightweight, even as they deliver buildable coverage that effortlessly layers, to ultimately “make skin look like skin.” Most importantly, Mary Magdalene creates makeup to inspire: “Makeup is there for you to have fun with,” she says. “It should never feel like pressure. It should never feel like a uniform. Feel free to take chances, and take risks, and dare to do something new or different."