Humans see other people's faces more than their own unless they are professional models or life coaches for mirrors. Polish up your reflection with today’s Groupon: for $49, you get a premium holiday facial with an arm-and-hand mint salt scrub at FaceToFace Spa at Avery Ranch (a $99 value).
At FaceToFace Spa at Avery Ranch, licensed aestheticians spruce up skin with a variety of facials, massages, and body services. During the 60-minute holiday facial a pumpkin-enzyme exfoliant clears away dirt, dead skin, and gingerbread-people particles, prepping the visage for an antioxidant cranberry mask and peppermint and ginger lip treatment. Wafting through the air, the essence of pine oil and clove adds an olfactory dimension to the sequence of treatments as a mint salt scrub and massage exfoliates arms and fingers. To promote a calming atmosphere, music pipes across the spa’s waiting area while patrons lounge in plush chairs, sip complimentary cinnamon-apple cider, or camouflage toes stained from grape stomping in the pile of purple rugs.
FaceToFace Spa at Avery Ranch
As she relates in a 2011 profile in Miss A, FaceToFace Spa's Jenny Abraham wrote herself a unique prescription in 2006: monthly facials, for the next five years. Abraham had suffered severe cystic acne since she was 15 years old, and the breakouts had crippled her self-esteem to the point where they seemed to even eclipse her accomplishments as a registered nurse. The regime restored her complexion's health, so she opened the spa in March 2011 to share her methods with her clients, just as kindergartners are taught to share their toys with others and their thoughts with Twitter.
Skin consultations are the jumping-off point for each treatment, which could take the shape of a topical therapy or an intervention with lasers or mechanical exfoliators. Nine peels, however, are the house specialty. Abraham mixes fruit enzymes or lactic acid to heal mild rosacea and promote cellular regeneration, and she blends more aggressive chemical formulas to clear actinic keratosis and diminish signs of aging. For all the face and body treatments, the staff relies on Dermalogica and GloTherapeutics products, which have been engineered without animal testing and eschew irritants such as perfume and skunk stink. Massage therapists take a holistic approach to beauty by relieving stress, and cosmetologists attend to the finishing touches with Lavish Lashes extensions and Jane Iredale cosmetics.