Belmont, CA Spa and Massage

While most dreams last until an alarm buzzes or someone pulls your blankets off, Mariola Javorski’s dream of running her own spa has lasted 22 years. As owner of Amazing Face Spa European Skin Care Studio, she leads a team of beauty professionals who use natural products from Europe to improve the skin’s appearance and health with facials, microdermabrasion, and body wraps for men and women. Nail services keep keratin well manicured and massages knead out tension, chronic aches, and stubborn knots that refuse to untie even for master magicians.

Essential Skin Therapy’s nutmeg-colored spa separates clients from the tensions of everyday life, providing a peaceful, quiet sanctuary for rejuvenation. Skincare specialists tend to aesthetic needs using products by Eminence Organic Skin Care, Glo, Obagi, and SkinCeuticals, nourishing and hydrating skin until it achieves the youthful glow of a newborn Lite-Brite. A free consultation precedes each facial, microdermabrasion, or massage, and allows technicians to customize products and techniques according to each patron's needs. The relaxing San Carlos day spa also tends to energy issues with chakra-aligning crystal treatments and positive reinforcement from golden retrievers.

Owner Toni Moore maintains a comfortable, homey salon-spa environment so that her clients can truly relax while being pampered. Swathed in earth tones, her beauty emporium boasts plush pink couches, framed artwork, and large windows, as well as verdant plants that dot the space with fresh green hues and occasionally demand new haircuts. Moore and her staff treat their clients to services for the whole body, from salon sessions in the form of haircuts, hair color, and relaxers to spa treatments such as facials and massages.

Inside A Cut Above Hair Salon, Laura of Lovely Looks by Laura adds finishing touches to her clients' looks with eyelash extensions, waxes, and spray tans. During eyelash-extension appointments, Laura bonds 35 to 40 extensions to individual lashes for a look that lasts up to three weeks. To keep up looks, Laura also offers touchup appointments to fill in any missing extensions after two weeks.

At Wat Po Thai Spa, a 2010 nominee for Best Day Spa by Best of LA, technicians bolster well-being with services that range from traditional Thai massage to skincare. The house-specialty Thai Combo fuses Thai massage, Swedish massage, and reflexology into an international amalgamation of relaxation similar to naptime at the UN. Thai massage harnesses compression, stretching, and rocking techniques to improve circulation of vital energy along the body's pathways, and Swedish massage encompasses gentle strokes such as gliding, kneading, and stretching to increase oxygen flow in the blood and forge full-body tension relief. Patrons walk away from massage sessions with relieved stress, allayed aches, increased internal alignment, and enough flexibility to fold bodies into an empty Pringles can at the first sign of danger.

Massage therapist Jeri Parks has more than two decades of experience in administering acupressure massages in the traditional Japanese amma style. This ancient technique relieves muscular discomfort via sequenced stretches and soothing pressure targeted at particular problem areas. Oils and lotions pamper skin, and trigger-point therapy works to alleviate pain and chronic muscle tension. Parks also administers off-site chair massage services at office gatherings, fundraisers, and tournaments of musical chairs.