Sharmadean Reid

Sharmadean Reid was born on 28 May 1984 in Wolverhampton, England, to a Jamaican family, her father being of Indian heritage. She studied at Central Saint Martins in London, and began her career in the creative world of magazines and youth culture, where her interest in nail art took root.

In August 2009 she opened the first WAH Nails salon in Dalston, East London, a creative space conceived as a clubhouse for the readers of her magazine, where women could meet, make friends and have inventive nail designs. It quickly grew into a cultural brand, with concessions at Topshop Oxford Circus and Harvey Nichols Dublin in 2010, shows and events at London Fashion Week, and a product line in Boots that earned £1.2 million in its first year.

In May 2017 she founded Beautystack with Daniel Woodbury and Ken Lalobo, an image-based booking platform that let customers book beauty professionals from a photo. In 2018 she raised over £1 million in seed funding, becoming the first Black woman in the UK to receive over £1 million in venture capital.

During the pandemic she pivoted Beautystack into The Stack World, launched in 2021, a community and financial education platform focused on women's economic independence and career growth. She also created the bath and body brand 39BC, and in June 2024 published her first book, New Methods for Women, with Penguin Life.

Reid was awarded an MBE in the 2015 Queen's Birthday Honours for services to the nail and beauty industry, and has been named Veuve Clicquot Bold Woman of the Year, Barclays Entrepreneur Icon of the Year and a Marie Claire Future Shaper. Central Saint Martins has made her an honorary fellow.