The £1,000 face

If you suddenly had £1,000 to drop on tweaking your face – how would you spend it? What might give you the best results? £1k is a sizeable wad of cash but then, cosmetic procedures are pricey. To hear some options, I spoke with some of TTG’s expert practitioners to find out what they’d suggest.

Lasers, says Dr John Quinn 

First thing is, £1k will buy you more outside of London says Dr John Quinn so if they want to spend their money wisely, consider that.

Regenerative medicine (aka treatments that help your body work better) is also a big buzzword at the moment, much as I love evidence and hate trends. In terms of lasers, they have the benefit of giving long-term regenerative improvement, and any laser treatment will give you younger skin, simple as that.

If I had £1,000 to spend I would probably aim for something like Intense Pulsed Light (IPL) or Laser Genesis, or a course of non-ablative laser. £1,000 is enough to have a full course of four or five sessions of any one of those, which will definitely improve your skin.

Which to choose? ‘It depends on your specific concern,’ says Dr Quinn. ‘If you are menopausal and flushing and red, why would you not have something like intense pulsed light? The Lumenis M22, is my favourite. If your issue is more about texture and benign sun damage, then you might think about the Lutronic LaseMD, it’s a fractional, non-ablative laser that really gets results. And if you’re younger and your skin is more oily, then the Cutera Laser Genesis is a very nice option.’

Is there anything else apart from laser that Dr Quinn would recommend? ‘If patients are under 45, with lots of collagen, it’s easy to work on and bank that collagen with radiofrequency,’ he says. ‘I’ll often recommend a good old-fashioned radiofrequency treatment like Exilis before moving on to anything else, it’s great for skin tightening.’

And should people spend any spare change on sunscreen? ‘Absolutely,’ says Dr Quinn. ‘100%!.’

Skin-regenerating polynucleotides, says Sharon Bennett

For Sharon Bennett, who is chair of BACN and has been working with injectable treatments for 30 years, restorative injectables like polynucleotides would be her key suggestion.

‘The thing about polynucleotides is that they’re a great primer for the skin for whatever else you might want to do afterwards. They will strengthen and hydrate; they’re natural; and they make your skin create collagen by making your own fibroblasts not just wake up but actually reproduce. Our fibroblasts get sluggish as we age and polynucleotides work even for more mature skin.

They are great on their own but also great in combination with other treatments too. I think that they will become an integral part of our practice – before you do anything else.’

OK, this sounds fantastic. So how much in the way of polynucleotide treatment would you get for £1k? ‘Outside London, you’d probably get four treatments,’ says Bennett, whose clinic is in Harrogate, Yorkshire. Each syringe of Plinest, the brand that she uses, contains 2ml of product, and that will treat an area – say, around the eyes.

‘Plinest is spectacular for eyes,’ adds Bennett, ‘and you can even inject it into the eyelids. It improves crepiness, tightens the skin, softens dark circles, and helps with neovascularisation [creating new micro blood vessels].  It’s great for people with rosacea because it strengthens the skin.’

She herself has tried polynucleotides in her neck and has seen – and felt – the improvement. ‘When you pinch the skin, it feels thicker,’ she says.

Is there anything this wonder-product can’t do? As Bennett points out, if you have a lot of volume loss, this isn’t the right product for you as it will not replace lost volume in your face. For that, you need filler, and if you have a good deal of volume loss, you may need more than £1,000-pounds-worth to do a decent job.

Also, it takes a few months for the results to become apparent, so people often feel there hasn’t been much change. Bennett says good before-and-after photos are vital, to help you see the difference. In particular, for treatments around the mouth area, perioral area and the fine lines on the cheeks and, lower face, you have to see the photos.

Skincare and microneedling, says Dr Rabia Malik

‘I would start with medical-grade skincare,’ says Dr Rabik Malik of SkinW1. ‘It’s a great investment with long-term benefits for skin. Look for active ingredients, including sun protection of SPF 30 or above, antioxidants like vitamin C and niacinamide, and collagen stimulators like peptides. Using these consistently over time makes the biggest difference to skin tone and texture, which is what I focus on, as this leads to glowing skin and a youthful complexion.’

Dr Malik doesn’t offer injectables in her practice, which often surprises people. ‘I focus on skin health and a holistic approach to ageing well,’ she says, ‘which means optimising internal health – with lifestyle, diet, and supplementation — using skincare with the right concentration of active ingredients, and focusing on treatments like skin peels and microneedling that specifically improve skin tone and texture.

‘I would kickstart this regime with an in-clinic microneedling treatment (at the Wellness Clinic at Harrods), which I combine with a lactic acid peel (Meso-Peel Lite Treatment, £495). This treatment is great for collagen stimulation and skin cell renewal, and the combination approach brightens and revitalises the skin. I would then then continue with my collagen-stimulating serum (£125) and moisturiser (£110) at home (from SkinW1)  as well as sunscreen. I might then advise the use of the Ante-Age at-home microneedling kit that comes with vials of growth factors, to maintain the in-clinic results.’

• Dr John Quinn, Quinn Clinics, Bristol
• Sharon Bennett, Harrogate Aesthetics, Harrogate
• Dr Rabia Malik, Skin W1, The Harrods Wellness Clinic, Knightsbridge, London.