Last week I went for a ‘signature’ facial at Vaishaly Patel’s skin clinic in Marylebone. I hadn’t done my research whatsoever before attending my appointment (naughty!) and so I was quite surprised to find that the first part of the 55 minute treatment was taken up with mild microdermabrasion and extraction. I presumed (because of what I knew about Vaishlay and her simple, pure products) that the whole experience would be very natural and massage-y, so they rather caught me on the back foot! The Vaishaly facial is purely prescriptive, so each and every treatment will be different, but there’s no long list of ‘options’ to choose from – the facialist will appraise your skin before deciding on a course of action.

My course of action was exfoliation, deep cleansing and then the most amazing, weird massage that made me have an out-of-body experience. I won’t go into too much detail, because I’ll regret it later when it starts coming up on Google. (Oh, OK: I started thinking that I was a goat-herder called Klaus. Really. It was most bizarre.) Anouk did this incredible Reiki-typed thing with her hands and frequently she would stop massaging  and just hold her palms over my face. Both elements of the ‘quiet’ part of the treatment were equally relaxing, but I did get into the habit of trying to double-guess when she would stop massaging and do the hands-still trick.

Results? Extremely glowy skin for near enough a week – I did get a few little pimply bumps come up on my chin region over the course of the week, but they were probably Klaus the goat-herder’s, not mine – these goat-herders have a terrible diet. One thing that I don’t like all that much is microdermabrasion. I’m usually game for anything during a facial (apart from ‘extras’!) but microdermabrasion always leaves my skin feeling very dry a few days down the line. I always worry that it has disturbed my skin’s balance in some way or another. Saying all that, this was the best version of microderm I have had – it was very mild and Anouk spent a long time afterwards pushing moisture back into the skin.

All joking (about goat-herders) aside, I did feel that this was a very spirit-lifting, mind-balancing facial. Not only did my skin look incredible, but I had a chance to let my mind totally blank out, which never happens. Even when I’m asleep I have these crazy full-throttle dreams going on, so it was something of a wonder that I actually managed to relax. I could definitely go in for just fifty-five minutes of the massage/reiki part!

Until recently, the Vaishaly Signature Facial was £250, performed by superfacialist Vaishaly Patel, but now it’s available through her specially trained assistants (Anouk being one of them) for £100. Something else that I’ve remembered: you know how in a lot of spas or treatment places have a million people clomping about all over the place whilst you try to relax? Not this one. It was dead quiet. The music was brilliant too – I forgot to ask them what it was, but I need it in my life.

Have a look on the Vaishaly Website for more details about treatments and products!