The Maercks Institute

The Maercks Institute Dr. Rian Maercks is an ABPS Board Certified Plastic Surgeon that specializes in surgery of the face, breast, and body. Dr. Rian A. Dr. Maercks received his M.D.

Maercks is a plastic surgeon in Miami, FL specializing in cosmetic and reconstructive surgery for the breast, body, face, and skin. Seen as an authority on plastic surgery on trusted resources such as RealSelf, Dr. Maercks is a renowned surgeon, innovator and researcher in the field of plastic surgery. Applying a tissue-centered approach with every surgery, which minimizes tissue injury, reduces complications, and improves recovery, Dr. Maercks performs breast augmentation, breast lift, tummy tuck, liposuction, facelift, and eyelid surgery. He creates aesthetic facial balancing blending nonsurgical treatments such as fillers, BOTOX, chemical and laser peels. at Duke University School of Medicine. He completed his residency at the world renowned Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center, and then an esteemed fellowship in aesthetic, craniofacial and reconstructive plastic surgery.

01/04/2026

⏳ What’s it like to be a patient of The Maercks Institute for 13 years?
Melissa’s journey says it all. 🎥✨

2013: Melissa came in to elevate her modeling career.
✅ Awake breast augmentation
✅ Pure local anesthesia 🚫 general anesthesia
✅ Transaxillary (through the armpit) + Cold‑Subfascial breast augmentation ©️
➡️ No scar on the breast (incision hidden in the underarm)

🌊 5 days later: she was modeling Miami Swim Week looking so natural people wondered how it was even possible.

👩‍👧 Over a decade later: beautiful anatomy held up through real life… including motherhood and breastfeeding. No problems breast feeding and after two rounds her implant position and breast aesthetics remain beautiful!

🧠🎨🔬 Along the way, she had dr Maercks revolutionary aesthetic facial balancing + small refinements that catapulted her career and even brought her family in for refinements because the doc’s approach is part philosophy, part art, part innovation.
Melissa highlights that what Dr Maercks offers his patients and has for over a decade is thought to be radically new by patients and the medical community.

💬 Melissa says it best: “Thank you for taking care of my body.”

Now she’s back, planning for future children and choosing implant removal… awake again, local-only, with the team she trusts. Again without placing any scars. Dr. Maercks is one of the few surgeons in the world that is comfortable performing breast revisions through the armpit!

📍 The Maercks Institute | Miami
💌 DM “MELISSA” if you have questions.

Shared with permission. Results & recovery vary. All surgery has risks. Educational only not medical advice.

BreastAugmentationJourney FacialBalancing ExplantJourney PatientStory AestheticPhilosophy

01/03/2026

✨ Selene’s Story :The Complete Journey ✨

This is the full story.
All six chapters, woven together into one 15-minute film.

A story that begins with deception, heartbreak, and loss of trust, and ends with restoration, joy, and a life reclaimed.

Selene came to The Maercks Institute after a devastating experience elsewhere.
She felt let down, altered, disconnected from her reflection, and unsure if she could ever trust again.
What she carried with her wasn’t just physical damage, it was emotional weight, fear, and the quiet grief of not recognizing herself anymore. Having her external appearance propagate and amplify a painful internal existence.

What followed was not just a surgical journey.

She found The Maercks Institute.
She met Dr. Maercks.
And step by step, through honesty, connection, artistry, and compassion, her life was restored.

This film takes you through every moment:
• the pain of feeling deceived
• the courage it takes to hope again
• the human connection between patient and doctor
• the awake surgery, calm and empowering
• the reflection in the mirror
• the follow-ups where she says, “I look like me again”

But Selene’s story is about more than a facelift.

She is symbolic of the patient journey at The Maercks Institute.

We are not here simply to change faces and bodies.
We are here to align the external expression with the internal truth of a person, to restore harmony, dignity, and timeless natural beauty that was always meant to be there. When the timeless beauty of the human form is respected and restored, true magic exists. This is Maercks Magic.

This is what happens when surgery is guided by mastery, philosophy, and humanity.
When medicine is practiced as an art.
When people are treated not as procedures, but as souls.

We are deeply proud of this work.
And we are profoundly happy for Selena.

🎥 Watch the full 15-minute documentary now.
This is Maercks Magic and this is why we do what we do.

TimelessBeauty RestoringIdentity SubtleButProfound PlasticSurgeryTransformation HumanArtistry FaceliftForEveryFace DrRianMaercks PatientJourney BeautyWithIntegrity

01/03/2026

✨ Selene’s Story: nThe Complete Journey ✨

This is the full story.
All six chapters, woven together into one 15-minute film.

A story that begins with deception, heartbreak, and loss of trust and ends with restoration, joy, and a life reclaimed.

Selene came to The Maercks Institute after a devastating experience elsewhere.
She felt let down, altered, disconnected from her reflection, and unsure if she could ever trust again.
What she carried with her wasn’t just physical damage, it was emotional weight, fear, and the quiet grief of not recognizing herself anymore.

What followed was not just a surgical journey.

She found The Maercks Institute.
She met Dr. Maercks.
And step by step through honesty, connection, artistry, and compassion, her life was restored.

This film takes you through every moment:
• the pain of feeling deceived
• the courage it takes to hope again
• the human connection between patient and doctor
• the awake surgery, calm and empowering
• the reflection in the mirror
• the follow-ups where she says, “I look like me again”

But Selene’s story is about more than a facelift.

She is symbolic of the patient journey at The Maercks Institute.

We are not here simply to change faces.
We are here to align the external expression with the internal truth of a person to restore harmony, dignity, and timeless natural beauty that was always meant to be there.

This is what happens when surgery is guided by mastery, philosophy, and humanity.
When medicine is practiced as an art.
When people are treated not as procedures, but as souls.

We are deeply proud of this work.
And we are profoundly happy for Selene.

🎥 Watch the full 15-minute documentary now.
This is Maercks Magic and this is why we do what we do.

RestoringIdentity SubtleButProfound PlasticSurgeryTransformation HumanArtistry FaceliftForEveryFace DrRianMaercks PatientJourney BeautyWithIntegrity

An unforgettable night at the Palm Tree Club supporting one of my favorite humans and my all-time favorite DJ, Nkosinath...
12/07/2025

An unforgettable night at the Palm Tree Club supporting one of my favorite humans and my all-time favorite DJ, Nkosinathi Maphumulo the legendary
Honored to be part of a beautiful evening that blended purpose, artistry, and community in the most powerful way.

We began the night around the dinner table, sharing great conversations, connecting with friends old and new, and hearing firsthand the incredible vision behind the Black Coffee Foundation. For more than a decade, the Foundation has uplifted underserved and disabled communities across South Africa through dignity-focused initiatives in education, opportunity, and long-term empowerment. Its impact is real, deep, and inspiring.

And then came an extraordinary DJ set by Black Coffee — the kind of musical experience only he can create — a perfect close to a night driven by heart and purpose.

Grateful to spend this time with this incredibly kind talented and humble LEGEND, to support a mission that truly matters, and to have these moments captured by World Red Eye. More to come. ✨

12/04/2025

🌟 Final Episode Selene’s Journey: Five Weeks Later

Five weeks after her awake revision facelift, Selene joined Dr. Maercks for a virtual follow-up and what unfolded became one of the most moving moments in her entire transformation.

With her signature bright smile, she said,
“Doctor, go to my Instagram, look at who I was before.”

She scrolled through old photos where she once felt distorted, unfeminine, and deeply unhappy after her previous surgery elsewhere.

“I used to feel ugly,” she admitted. “I didn’t even recognize myself anymore.”

Then she directed him to a new photo a picture of her and her daughter the one that has gone viral among her friends and family.

“Look at this one,” she said. “We look like sisters, not mother and daughter.”

And she wasn’t wrong.
Her features are restored, harmonious, natural a reflection of the woman she was in her twenties, now reborn at fifty-three.

She lifted her face to the camera, glowing:
“I feel transformed. Completely. I feel beautiful again. I feel alive again.”

She shared how everything in her life has changed:
her confidence, her work, her relationships, her joy, even her sense of longevity and purpose.

“This surgery didn’t just fix my face… it fixed my life.”

For a patient who once felt hopeless and unrecognizable, this moment was the culmination of a journey from despair to rebirth, a reminder of how deeply healing true artistry and compassion can be.

💫 Final Episode Selene’s Journey: The Transformation Complete

The full documentary, her complete emotional and surgical story premieres soon on YouTube .

12/04/2025

🌟 Final Episode Selene’s Journey: Five Weeks Later

Five weeks after her awake revision facelift, Selene joined Dr. Maercks for a virtual follow-up and what unfolded became one of the most moving moments in her entire transformation.

With her signature bright smile, she said,
“Doctor, go to my Instagram… look at who I was before.”

She scrolled through old photos where she once felt distorted, unfeminine, and deeply unhappy after her previous surgery elsewhere.

“I used to feel ugly,” she admitted. “I didn’t even recognize myself anymore.”

Then she directed him to a new photo a picture of her and her daughter the one that has gone viral among her friends and family.

“Look at this one,” she said. “We look like sisters… not mother and daughter.”

And she wasn’t wrong.
Her features are restored, harmonious, natural a reflection of the woman she was in her twenties, now reborn at fifty-three.

She lifted her face to the camera, glowing:
“I feel transformed. Completely. I feel beautiful again. I feel alive again.”

She shared how everything in her life has changed:
her confidence, her work, her relationships, her joy, even her sense of longevity and purpose.

“This surgery didn’t just fix my face… it fixed my life.”

For a patient who once felt hopeless and unrecognizable, this moment was the culmination of a journey from despair to rebirth a reminder of how deeply healing true artistry and compassion can be.

💫 Final Episode Selene’s Journey: The Transformation Complete

The full documentary her complete emotional and surgical story premieres soon on YouTube .

12/03/2025

Dr. Maercks continues redefining what’s possible.

At The Maercks Institute, lipoderma to the face is not just a treatment, it is an artistic intervention guided by two decades of pioneering work. Dr. Maercks was the first to introduce the concept of Aesthetic Facial Balancing in the early 2000s, long before it became a global movement. Today, that same philosophy drives every detail of his lipoderma techniques: restoring harmony, softening asymmetries, and re-sculpting the face with subtlety and intention.

In this beautiful case, we use Lipoderma in the face to correct depletion, restore natural contours, and create a refreshed luminosity that still looks completely like you. No distortion, no volume excess just refined, elegant, structural enhancement rooted in true artistry.

A quick, painless treatment
A profound return to balance
A continuation of Dr. Maercks’ lifelong dedication to natural beauty

We invite you to experience why patients from across the world trust The Maercks Institute for results that elevate without ever revealing.

12/02/2025

✨ Part 6 : Selene Returns: “I Look Like Me Again.”

This story converts what The Maercks Institute and is really about, profoundly thoughtful interventions that translate in to profound changes in oir patients global lives✨✨✨

After a month away, Selene walked back into The Maercks Institute for her follow-up and refused to do it virtually because she wanted to surprise Dr. Maercks in person.

The moment she stepped through the door, she was glowing. She smiled, took a deep breath, and said the words that moved the entire team:

“I look like me again… I’m so happy.”

Turning 53 this year, Selene shared side-by-side photos from her youth pictures she treasured from when she was 23 and for the first time in decades, she saw the same face looking back at her.
Beautiful. Radiant. Harmonious.

In her follow-up, she shows Dr. Maercks her comparison photos her current face nearly identical to her daughter’s and to the youthful image she always loved but feared she’d lost forever.

And then she said something that captured the entire journey, more than any before-and-after could:

“My whole life is transformed. Everything is better — my work life, my family life, my friendships… my soul. I feel happiness again. I even feel like I have longevity now. Before coming here… I was dead.”

This is not just a physical transformation.
It’s a return to self.
A restoration of identity, confidence, and joy.

💫 Part 6 Selene’s Story: The Return.

Her journey continues to remind us that when the face is restored with artistry, respect for anatomy, and true compassion the spirit rises with it.

Stay tuned for the full documentary film of Selene’s extraordinary transformation coming soon to YouTube .

Victoria returns for her second Lipoderma treatment at The Maercks Institute, and the results speak for themselves.Today...
12/01/2025

Victoria returns for her second Lipoderma treatment at The Maercks Institute, and the results speak for themselves.

Today we evaluated her progress and the area we treated in her first session is completely corrected. Her hip dips are now beautifully contoured, smooth, and harmonious… exactly the kind of natural balance Lipoderma is designed to create.

We went forward with her second treatment to refine the next zone, and the transformation is already incredible. This painless, quick in-office experience continues to be one of our favorite ways to sculpt subtle, lasting shape with biologic precision.

We’re excited to share the before-and-after photos and videos so you can see her journey in real time, the artistry, the science, and the beauty of biologic contouring done right.

The Maercks Institute
Beauty as it was meant to be.

11/27/2025

Today we continue this remarkable story.

Twelve years ago, this patient trusted The Maercks Institute with something that was unheard of at the time. Her transazillary (through the armpit) breast augmentation was performed completely awake under local anesthesia, an experience she still describes as joyful, calm, and surprisingly fun. What still feels revolutionary to the world in 2025 has been part of our daily approach for more than a decade.

Since that first experience she has continued to trust The Maercks Institute and Dr Maercks with the faces and bodies of the people closest to her. Friends, family, and eventually her own face. When she returned for Aesthetic Facial Balancing, the transformation was once again subtle yet life changing. It elevated her confidence and expanded her career in ways she never expected at this stage in her life.

Her journey is a testament to what natural looking artistry, trust, and truly patient centered care can create. More chapters of her story coming soon.

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11/24/2025

From Model to Miami Swim Week in Three Days

Today we share the first chapter of a beautiful story. In 2013 this incredible patient came to The Maercks Institute seeking a completely natural looking breast augmentation that would honor her 20 year career as a working model. She had never booked swimsuit jobs before her procedure, yet three days after her cold subfascial breast augmentation under local anesthesia she walked the runway at Miami Swim Week with total confidence.

Her transformation was subtle, organic, and true to her form. No pain, no sedation, no downtime, and nothing that looked done. Just structure, balance, and the quiet power of feeling aligned with your body.

In this first video she reflects on how her results reshaped her career and her sense of self. Over the next six videos we will share more about her experience including her awake surgery, the natural technique behind cold subfascial augmentation, and the care and intention that guided every step.

We are grateful to have been part of her journey and cannot wait for you to see the full story.

11/14/2025

✨ One Month Follow Up: Real Results, Real Life ✨

Today’s virtual check in was pure joy.
One month after her Composite Deep Plane Facelift, this beautiful patient logged on absolutely glowing, and the stories she shared say everything.

At dinner with friends, people who are usually anti surgery or completely unaware of aesthetics were staring at her saying

“You look 20 years younger.”
“It’s like you’re FaceTuned in real life.”
“I can’t even tell what you did. You just look amazing.”

This is the beauty of a result that looks untouched, unoperated, and completely her. It is the quiet kind of transformation that blends seamlessly into her natural structure and restores her authentic harmony.

Nothing pulled. Nothing obvious. Only her, refreshed and radiant.

These are the moments we cherish at The Maercks Institute. Watching a patient feel celebrated, confident, and truly herself again is the greatest reward.

🩺 A one month check in with a remarkable human rediscovering her own radiance.

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Miami, FL

Opening Hours

Monday 9am - 5pm
Tuesday 9am - 5pm
Wednesday 9am - 5pm
Thursday 9am - 5pm
Friday 9am - 5pm

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+13053288256

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Our Story

Dr. Rian A. Maercks has become a global focal point for those with interest in natural appearing interventions, and has helped thousands of patients by specializing in plastic surgery and non-invasive, cosmetic procedures for aesthetic improvements of the face, breast, and body in Miami, FL.

Dr. Maercks is most notably known for his non-surgical face lift technique, known as Aesthetic Facial Balancing which leverages his training as a fine artist, philosopher, craniofacial and reconstructive plastic surgeon, to deliver patients beautiful natural appearing results. He delivers results most think would require surgery with nothing but a needle in about fifteen minutes including rhinoplasty, facelift, blepharoplasty and browlift. Dr. Maercks is also known for his natural and scarless appearing Cold-Subfascial Breast Augmentation©.

Dr. Maercks has performed countless breast augmentations, breast lifts, breast revisions, and other face and body surgeries.