Claudia Kim arrived in Singapore at an unusual moment. She had just been named the face of Bobbi Brown in Asia and was in the middle of training for Netflix’s Marco Polo. She spoke candidly about Korean beauty standards, fillers and ageing, and she also named kaya, the coconut jam, as a craving.
Her remarks were unusually blunt for a beauty ambassador. She said she was against fillers and had no plans to have work done on her face. She also described a cleansing routine she relied on between workouts, and she shared a pancake recipe built around kaya.
The moment: a new face for Bobbi Brown
In 2015, Kim was chosen to front the beauty brand in Asia. It was the first time the company had appointed a spokesperson for one market specifically, while Kate Upton remained the global face. Bobbi Brown’s president, Maureen Case, said the brand picked her because she radiates health, confidence and natural beauty. The campaign had started in Korea and was due to reach the rest of Asia Pacific, including Singapore, by July 2015.
At the time she was also moving fast on screen. She played Khutulun, the warrior niece of Kublai Khan, in Marco Polo, and Dr Helen Cho in Avengers: Age of Ultron. The training for the Netflix role is where her cleansing habit came from.
How she got there
Kim’s path was not a straight line. Born in Seoul, she moved to New Jersey with her family at five and spent six years there learning English before returning to Korea, where she began modelling. Her first acting job was the drama Queen of the Game (SBS, 2006-07). She later stepped back from the screen, then returned in various Korean series. In 2012 she went to Hollywood.
That background helps explain her view of beauty. She had worked in the Korean industry and then alongside Western colleagues, and she compared the two.
What she said about skin, fillers and ageing
She described Korean society as intensely competitive about complexions, where she said perfect skin is expected of men and women alike. Commenting on someone’s breakout is routine there, she said, and she tried to avoid giving anyone the chance.
On cosmetic work, she was firm. She called herself totally against fillers, which she found unnatural, and said she could always spot them. Her colleagues on Marco Polo, she said, had shown her a different ideal, in which people value the character that wrinkles give a face. She wanted to age gracefully and look her age, even if her Asian peers preferred to look perpetually in their twenties.
She also argued that frozen faces limit an actor’s craft. Fear of ageing, she suggested, usually points to insecurity elsewhere, and looking after your inner self matters more than a few creases.
Her routine and favourite products
- Cleansing between workouts: Because Marco Polo required outdoor training, she toned her face with cleansing water and cotton pads after sweating. She then reapplied moisturiser and sunscreen, to keep dirt from settling into open pores.
- Bottled water: When travelling she avoided tap water on her face, a tip from her model friends. She added that Singapore’s tap water was pretty good and that she was more cautious elsewhere.
- Lip balm: She admitted to panic when she forgot hers and said she bought a new one immediately.
- Lip colour: She named Bobbi Brown’s Pot Rouge in a coral shade, Calypso, as her all-time favourite. At that point she was leaning towards a cherry-chocolate tone to go with black outfits.
- No lip liner: She said overdrawing the lips can age the face and leaves a ring of colour once it fades.
The kaya pancakes
Her kitchen habits were just as specific. She said she made pancakes from one whole egg and three egg whites blended with chia seeds, bananas and a handful of rolled oats. The batter went onto a griddle like any regular pancake, and she spread kaya on top.
What came next
The two roles she was juggling in 2015 led on to more work. Marco Polo ran on Netflix from 2014 to 2016. Even after her US success, she returned to Korea as a series regular on the MBC drama Monster in 2016. Her later screen credits include the film Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald.
Her Bobbi Brown role began as a regional first for the brand, and it was the setting for the views on ageing she gave in Singapore.