Alumnae Spotlight: Rae Denman-Tanner

Rae Denman-Tanner (Rachael Denman) 1991

Rae is a medical tattooist, para-medical camouflage specialist and trainer who changes lives by giving patients a solution to their visible differences. Now, she can help even more people through medical tattoo scar training.

People with visible differences may face physical, psychological, and evolving challenges through genetics, surgery, medical conditions, or trauma. Rae’s passion is to use her skills, knowledge, and techniques to improve individuals’ confidence and aesthetic appearance, using definition and colour to enhance, not just hide.

Rae runs private clinics at The London Scar Clinic, Harley Street, London, and Reigate, Surrey. She offers medical tattooing repigmentation for patients with scarring, skin grafts, hypopigmentation, vitiligo, port wine stains and hair, brow and lash loss, as well as restoration pigmentation for cleft lips post-surgery, nipple areola post-mastectomy and reconstruction, and gender reassignment realism.

Rae won the ’20 Years of Excellence’ Finishing Touches group award for life changing procedure. This award goes to the technician who has changed lives with their work by putting colour back into people’s lives.

Rae tells us she was very arts based at school and certainly did not know anything about medical tattooing. She went on to do a graphic design degree before training for a diploma in fashion and photographic make-up at the Glauca Rossi school of make-up. Some of her work included body painting for pop videos for artists such as the Spice Girls, plus catwalk shows but explains that she got to a stage where this wasn’t enough for her; she really wanted to help people. So, she went on to gain a diploma in skin camouflage, at the British Association of Skin Camouflage. After this, she received psycho-social training in burn care rehabilitation at the NHS London and South East Burns Network and micropigmentation at Finishing Touches Ltd.

Rae now offers her training, ‘The RD-MT Smart Scar Training,’ to create a larger pool of talented, motivated, skilled, and empowered professionals to deliver life-changing scar treatments.

We were keen to discover Rae’s fondest memory of Croydon High School.

“The majority of my memories are moments in time with friends. The friendship groups I had at Croydon High still feature heavily in my life today, and I am forever grateful for them. We worked hard in school, trained hard in sports and laughed hard together. I can’t seem to separate those into one memory.”

She went on to say,

“Croydon High gave me a solid foundation that hard work pays off. The amount of training we had to do in netball – to win nearly every match – was extensive, but it paid off and has instilled in me that if you want to achieve something, daily practice and consistency will help pave your way.”

We asked Rae about her aspirations for the future.

“I am currently offering Medical Tattoo Scar training to pass on all the information I have accumulated over the years so that more patients can be helped worldwide, and the message about Medical Tattooing gets out to more people, so in time, it will be a standard part of the healing process. With this in mind, I am bringing back my creative endeavours, showing through body painting how a different viewpoint can change perceptions of visible differences.”

A few years ago, Rae stirred much interest amongst Croydon High pupils as a delegate at our Careers Convention. We asked her what she would say to her 15-year-old self.

“I would tell her to slow down in order to listen to her instincts more, so she can build the confidence to live her life fully in her own way.”

Good advice: Rae is certainly living a full life in her own unique way, and it is a pleasure to put the spotlight on her this week.