FROM THE FRONT | Madonna opens first Hard Candy Fitness center in Mexico City

YE OF bulging biceps and limber legs just opened the first gym of her new international chain Hard Candy Fitness (after her last album) in a posh Mexico City neighbourhood. Clearly, this woman's earning power knows no bounds...

What do you get for the $160 monthly dues and an initiation fee that's inching towards $1,000? Apparently Madonna has personally helped craft the classes (yoga, capoeira, dance, etc.) and you get to stare at giant Lichtenstein-esque pictures of the singer (for inspiration) while breaking a sweat on the rows of workout equipment in this vast space (3,000 square meters vast). America will have to wait, although we bet the UK won't have to for as long...

Russia, Brazil, Argentia and undisclosed locations in Europe and Asia are the next spots to get their own Hard Candy gyms. The US won't see one on its soil for some time.

Hard Candy Fitness has been opened by Madoona in partnership with the founder of 24 Hour Fitness, Mark Mastrov and her manager.

The strapline on the Hard Candy Fitness website? Harder is better. Clearly the mantra by which the material girls lives by when it comes to working out. 

Get ready to work it like the Material Girl in Mexico City.

FROM THE FRONT | Nip & Fab launched by Rodial

IT LOOKS like we have another Marcia Kilgore on our hands. Maybe. Because the Nip & Fab range is created by Rodial founder Maria Hatzistefanis. Although I have yet to find a Rodial product, despite all the hype, that I really like (or get amazing results from). That said, Rodial is a successful brand (somehow... sorry, I couldn't help it) and it looks like Nip & Fab will be too. American readers, you'll have to order it through the Boots website.

Commissioned by Boots to create an accesible yet luxury brand for them, Nip & Fab has launched into Boots and Harvey Nichols. It's tag line? That ever product does what it says on the front. Every product is a 'fix' so to speak -- tummy fix, cellulite fix, dry leg fix, etc. The website lists just a few of the key ingredients for each product. The Harvey Nichols website has much better descriptions.

The price point? Much less than the hefty pricetag on many of the Rodial products, all 11 SKUs ranging from £7.95 to £18.95. The Nip & Fab Multi-Fix Oil has won a Pure Beauty award for Best Bodycare Launch of 2010 already and the Tummy Fix has sold out (though is now back in stock).

But, Nip & Fab isn't the first brand in this trend. For the past few years, stores have been commissioning slicker, higher-end brands to create ranges for them.

Our favourites:

• Good Works by This Works
• Sophyto for Sam's Club

FROM THE FRONT | Origins Plantscription Anti-Aging Serum set to launch

AND THE company is singing from the rooftops about it, using no less superlative a term than milestone.

Why? Because the organization has apparently discovered a new must-have ingredient, from leaf and bark extract of the African Anogeissus tree. Sustainably harvested in Ghana, it’s the star ingredient in the Origins Plantscription anti-aging serum.

Origins claims this star ingredient has the same effect on skin as retinoic acid, the vitamin A derivative we’ve all been going bonkers over in recent years. Apparently, this extract works by stimulating production of a protein that forms the elastic fibers in the skin to strengthen it. By speeding up cell turnover (which is what retinoic acid does), it also helps to ease the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles. Other active ingredients include siegesbeckia, rosemary extract, peptides and vitamin C.

You’re supposed to get the benefits of an injection without the side effects after. That said, I’ve yet to come across a cream or beauty product that lives up to such claims. Injections, for one, are placed much deeper than the surface, where creams are applied and only partially absorbed. Second, to have a prescription-strength OTC product, you usually have to, well, have a prescription. Perhaps this newly discovered ingredient is Origins’s secret weapon, though, helping them to circumnavigate the process of getting a cream approved with OTC benefits but without prescription ingredients.

According to Jane Lauder, the general manager of Origins, “Our customers said they wanted anti-aging, but in a natural, healthy way, not through procedures or injections.”

Plantscription launches February, 2011, after five years of research and development, testing and clinical trials to back up the product’s claims. U.S. Origins stores like Macy’s, Dillard’s, Bon-Ton and Belk will sell 30-mL vials at $55 retail.

Read the original post here, written by www.beautywoome.com's Jessica for Smarter Beauty Blog.