Mirror, Mirror | Special skin specialist

Susan C. Taylor is flawlessly pretty, just like former beauty queen Vanessa Williams, and her warm laugh is reminiscent of down-to-earth, no-nonsense

Cosby Show

matriarch Clair Huxtable.

But it's her expertise in treating sensitive skin of color that has catapulted the dermatologist to near-celebrity status among Philadelphia's high-powered women, including NBC10 anchor Monique Braxton and City Councilwoman Blondell Reynolds Brown, who depend on Taylor to keep their skin clear.

"My passion is researching and understanding skin of color," Taylor said. "This is my way of serving the community. I could have never known it would take me this far."

The Today show regular's new skin-care line, Dr. Susan Taylor's Rx for Brown Skin, debuted last month in cosmetics superstore Sephora.

And the fourth printing of her book, Brown Skin: Dr. Susan Taylor's Prescription for Flawless Skin, Hair and Nails (Harper Collins, 2003), will be out early next year. The 300-page book has been renamed Dr. Taylor's Rx for Brown Skin and in addition to the basic hair, skin and nails maintenance information, it will include an updated foreword and a new chapter on toners.

"The potential market for this book is so broad and with increasing diversity in this country, what we wanted to do is keep it front and center," said Toni Sciarra, Taylor's editor at HarperCollins. "She knows her topic professionally and personally."

Today, celebrity dermatologists are everywhere - just look at Fredric Brandt and Nicholas Perricone - but Taylor's colleagues say few physicians have taken the time as she has to understand the effects of new products and procedures on skin of color. And, they say, as the world gets browner, she has become more sought after.

"She's taught us to be aware of issues," said Henry Lim, chairman of the department of dermatology at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit. "It's not about treatment per se, but there are issues that come up more commonly in skin of color, like scarring and cultural issues. She has helped the dermatology world become more aware of them."

There is definitely an air of exclusivity among Taylor's client list, which includes women of all races in Philadelphia, New York and the surrounding area.

Patients often wait months for an appointment with her (and even then, they may be seen by her physician assistant, Julie Carson). Taylor says her practice treats more than 150 people a week.

Some say Taylor has a prickly bedside manner and can be a bit standoffish. She's as no-frills as the black Armani pantsuits she sometimes wears.

But all of her patients say Taylor is totally thorough. Maritza Ranero, 46, of Center City gets periodic Botox injections to make her look younger.

"I wouldn't go to anyone else," Ranero said.

Charlotte Petrina, 37, has been plagued with adult acne for years. Twelve years ago, she started going to Taylor. After an evaluation, the doctor started Petrina on medication and followed it up with chemical peels.

"You follow the regimen she sets up for you and you will have amazing skin," said Petrina, whose skin has nary a pimple these days.

Today, Susan Cherise Taylor - she uses the C to distinguish herself from Susan L. Taylor, editorial director of Essence magazine - leads the life one might expect from a high-profile doctor with a national brand.

Her hairstylist comes weekly to her Wynnewood home, where he does her hair on a salon-size chair. Taylor works with a personal trainer, who also makes house calls. When she turned 50 this month, she took her girlfriends on a weekend cruise. She is a major fan of HGTV. Her demeanor is that of a teacher.

Her family life is relatively quiet, centering on her daughters Morgan, 15, and Madison, 11. Her husband, Kemel Dawkins, vice president for campus services at Duke University in North Carolina, is on the road a lot. (He was recently offered the position of architect of the Capitol, a nonpartisan appointment by President Bush, but turned it down.)

"The next time he makes a move, he wants it to be home," Taylor said.

But there was definitely a time when Taylor was more aspirational.

She was born in Pennsylvania Hospital and grew up in North Philly and parts of South Philly and Wynnewood. Taylor's parents divorced when she was 5, and she and her sister Flora grew up with her mother, who worked for the government as an equal employment opportunity specialist. Taylor said she wanted to be a doctor since she was 7, inspired by her own pediatrician, Pat Pascharelli.

As a child, she liked to watch General Hospital while her grandmother babysat her.

"I think . . . no, I know that's why she wanted to be a doctor, because she watched General Hospital with my mother," her mother, Ethel Taylor, said with a laugh.

"When I found out she was really intersted in medicine, I did everything I could to continue her interest. . . . Now she puts everything into what she does. And she has this new product and I thought, Uh-oh . . . here she goes again. She's on a tear."

Taylor and her sister attended Friends Select School. She went on to the University of Pennsylvania and Harvard Medical School.

Taylor wanted to study internal medicine, but after a dermatology rotation she was hooked on the study of skin.

"I loved everything about it," Taylor said. "You could see it and feel it and touch the disease. . . . You touched the lives of diverse groups of people and age groups."

Taylor graduated from medical school in 1983, then was a resident for five years. She practiced dermatology part-time at the Philadelphia Health Centers before opening her own practice in Society Hill in 1989.

"The first week, the only people who come are your friends and all the people your mother told your business about," Taylor said, laughing.

She spent 10 years building her practice by working with local HMOs. But she got her big break when the Today show called and asked her to be a guest on a show about fingernails.

Shortly after that, her colleague Vince DeLeo asked her to help found the Skin of Color Center at St. Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital in New York. Today there are similar centers in Detroit, Miami and Chicago.

"Susan has defined the field when it comes to people of color and skin issues," said DeLeo, chairman of the department of dermatology at St. Luke's-Roosevelt. "She has quickly become the leading voice in the area."

Her expertise has led Taylor to found the Skin of Color Society. This month, she was elected to the American Academy of Dermatology and traveled to Buenos Aires to give four lectures about skin of color at the World Conference of Dermatology.

She has spent the last several months crisscrossing the country, training Sephora skin-care specialists on the proper way to sell her line. She is writing a manual on the subject for the store, and will make several publicity appearances.

"I'm so pleased with everything," Taylor said from her office. "Who knew that when I started dermatology all these years ago, it would take me here? I'm a CEO of my own cosmetics company. It's amazing!"