Noticed that I’ve slowed down a touch on recommending facials? This isn’t a sign of my having given up trying all and sundry, but rather of my exacting standards when it comes to facials; this blog is my place, dictated by none and I can accordingly set the barometer very high indeed.
Based in Richmond on the top floor of a hairdresser on quaint King Street, Cherry greeted me under the exceedingly low roof of her treatment room (‘mind your head’ almost became a refrain throughout the two hours I spent in her care).
After a consultation about my skin type, history of bodily issues etc. etc. I slid under the turquoise blanket of the treatment bed. As with all the ‘super facialists’ I’ve seen, Cherry and I spent the entire session chatting away. That’s not to say she’s loquacious, more that she is passionately involved in her work and – with prompts in the form of a stream of questions my end – was more than happy to share the enormous wealth of knowledge she has on skin.
A little on her background: Cherry trained as a therapist, preferring facials to other treatments from the off. A marriage to a news reporter afforded an opportunity to travel and when living in America Cherry stopped practising altogether and started to enrol in courses to really grasp how skin behaves and, crucially, how its behaviour can be controlled. A bout of rosacea that started to plague her consolidated her desire to really understand skin. From there, Cherry’s ascent has been sure and steady – loyal clients and journalists all flood to her door both for treatments and to pick her brains.
During my session Cherry applied products by Eminence (divine, organic), Epionce (more clinical, still divine) and Epicuren (very targeted, very effective). She extracted, massaged my face and shoulders with deep, kneading motions, used gadgets galore to push product deeper/reduce redness and told me the why and what throughout.