(Rahav Segev)
SHOW SOME SKIN: Fabricio Ormonde studied at the Aveda Institute where he was the only male to earn an esthetics license in 2009. He now performs non invasive procedures at Gotham Plastic Surgery. (
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While women infiltrate notorious boys’ clubs such as finance and technology, men are similarly cracking into female-dominated careers. They’re nurses, nannies and beauty pros — and they’re completely secure in their posts. Read on to meet three New York guys breaking into the girls’ club.
* The Mesthetician
Fabricio Ormonde, 35, Chelsea
When Fabricio Ormonde was young, his mother had to pry him away from department-store skin care counters. By age 12, he was a bona fide product junkie. But despite early signs that he was destined for a career in skincare, it would be years before Ormonde had his “aha” moment.
The Rio de Janeiro-born esthetician was working in reservations and sales for a Brazilian airline when he visited and fell in love with New York in 2001. He moved to the city the following year and enrolled at the Institute for Integrative Nutrition, earning a certification in holistic health counseling. Over time, he noticed a knack for helping clients not only feel good, but look good, too. It was then that he decided to make what friends and family deemed a controversial career move.
“When I said I wanted to be an esthetician, everyone was against it,” he says. “They said, ‘This is going to be hard for you. You’re a man, and that’s a girl’s job.’”
Though his first instinct was to listen to naysayers, he eventually decided to listen to himself. “Skincare is not only my passion, but it’s my calling,” he says. “It’s something I couldn’t ignore.”
So Ormonde headed to the Aveda Institute where, in 2009, he was the only male in his class to earn an esthetics license. (Another one started but didn’t complete his studies.) After finishing the program he worked alongside dermatologists and later taught at the Dermalogica Academy.
Today, Ormonde performs non invasive procedures at Gotham Plastic Surgery and runs his own mobile skincare business, performing facials, chemical peels, laser treatments and more in clients’ homes. If anything, he says, being a man has contributed to his success. “I saw it as an opportunity for me to stand out,” he says. “I never saw it as something negative.”
Ormonde says he’s grown so used to being the lone male at professional events that he’s unfazed by it. And as for people’s reaction to him being a male esthetician, most are only taken aback for a second before they start prodding him for tips. “[People] want a consultation right away!” he exclaims.
* The Manny
John Brandon, 27, Harlem
Before male nannies were literally in Vogue (Manhattanite and “The Manny” author Holly Peterson wrote about hers in a July 2007 editorial) John Brandon was caring for two boys, ages 4 and 6, in Princeton, NJ.
In 2006, a regular at the restaurant Brandon then worked at asked him to babysit on a Friday night. Brandon accepted — but made sure his girlfriend came along. “I had never been a babysitter in my entire life,” he says. “I felt like I needed her with me.” But Brandon, then a Westminster Choir College junior, took to it naturally. “We had a blast!” he recalls. “We played games, we went outside and played basketball — it became a cool bonding experience.” So much so that the family hired Brandon to be their live-in sitter for the next year, though his job title was somewhat ambiguous. “We didn’t even consider that that was called a nanny,” he says — but looking back, he feels the label was the most fitting.
Brandon has since worked with four more families, including one in Stuttgart, Germany where the trained opera singer performed with a professional ensemble, and a high-profile NYC couple whose son he cares for today. Earlier this year Brandon launched a boutique agency dubbed NYC Mannies, much to the surprise — and in some cases, amusement — of friends and strangers.
“I get varied reactions,” Brandon says of the reception to his work, citing surprise, shock and confusion among the most common. Buddies he grew up with in Chattanooga, Tenn., have asked, “What the heck are you doing?”
His answer is what he loves, inspired in part by a personal tragedy. “My dad died when I was 14, and guys came into my life to teach me things,” he says, adding that many of his clients are single mothers without a male figure in the household. “I’m not just going around with a stroller and sitting on a park bench.” In fact, to make the NYC Manny cut, one must be as adept in helping with homework as they are in playing outdoors. Brandon describes most applicants as young and athletic, and notes that a college degree is required.
“I know for a Southern, straight male, certain people don’t think [this is] cool or manly,” he says, “but that doesn’t affect me.”
THE MURSES
Mark Andaya, 46, Harlem
Matt Fisher, 24, Upper East Side
There is no stereotype about male nurses that Matt Fisher hasn’t faced—from the notion that he can’t possibly be straight (he is) to the idea that he really wants to be a doctor (he doesn’t). He was one of seven men in a class of 110 at Georgia Baptist College of nursing, and patients have asked him to his face when he’s going back to school. Still, Fisher has zero regrets about his chosen profession.
“I love being a nurse,” he says, adding that contrary to what some may assume, his RN role at the Hospital for Special Surgery is a great fit for a guy. “We like to work with our hands, we like to talk, and we usually like to keep our emotions out of things. That’s exactly what we do during the day.”
While Fisher has encountered skeptics, male nurses are far more visible now than when Mark Andaya began his nursing career in the early ’90s.
“Of course I was sensitive to that,” Andaya says, recalling that he had to be chaperoned in the maternity ward while studying at City College. Drawn to what he describes as the “human component” to the job, however, the Philippines-born nurse practitioner went on launch a fulfilling career that’s included a 12-year stretch at Mount Sinai and the completion of a master’s degree at Columbia. Currently, Andaya oversees the training and education of home health aids for Partners in Care, an affiliate of the Visiting Nurse Service of New York.
“There’s science behind nursing and providing care,” Andaya counters to the misconception that nurses simply smiling faces who hand out medicine. “There’s research behind each and every procedure that we do.”
” ‘Meet the Parents’ certainly didn’t help male nurses!” he jokes, citing the 2000 comedy where Gaylord Focker (Ben Stiller) is teased mercilessly by his would-be father-in-law Jack (Robert De Niro) for being a nurse. “But those traditional lines are becoming blurred,” Andaya adds.