Viva Magazine

Age-Defying facial with Facial Radiance massage

The Promise: The complete facial experience will leave you with more toned, smoother, younger-looking skin and firmer facial muscles. Begins with a customised facial using powerful plant-based, antioxidant Janesce products. Designed with stressed or tired skin in mind, it helps improve the microcirculation and oxygenation of your skin, leaving it luminous and hydrated. Perfect for those who wish to minimise fine lines and wrinkles, sculpt the jaw and neck, plump the cheeks, lips and lift the eye area. The skin is left looking noticeably rejuvenated.

The Practice: I wind my way high up in the Waitakeres to where natural beauty and massage therapist Julia O’Gorman – whose extensive career includes eig

ht years working at a luxury spa with rich-list private clients in Bermuda – has the ideal work- from-home set up. A separate salon area in her immaculate house has views down through greenery beyond Titirangi towards the Manukau Harbour. It is easy to relax in such surrounds and Julia’s manner puts me further at ease as she explains the treatment and asks about my skin. I’ve had a Facial Radiance massage previously from New Zealand trainer Lynda Davenport and really rated it for noticeably lifting my facial contours. Lynda uses a no-product dry massage technique, but Julia has incorporated the Janesce range she uses in other facials, which focus on “soaking” the skin in hydrating plant extracts. This makes for a more pampering, but equally as e ective, treatment, confirmed by a look in the mirror after one half of the face had been worked on and by my appearance over the next few days.

The Place: Julia O’Gorman Natural Beauty & Massage Therapist’s home studio in Waiatarua. Ph (09) 8189989 or see beauty-therapist.co.nz
The Price: $160 for 90 minutes or $120 for an hour-long massage without facial.
The Verdict: Unless you live out west, it’s a bit of a drive, but well worth the effort. I nodded off under the gentle manipulation that left me fuller of cheek and firmer of jaw. – Janetta Mackay