Hydrafacial

What is a Hydrafacial?

Hydrafacial is a personalised, non-invasive treatment designed to address your skin’s unique needs. Using a three-step process—cleanse, extract, and hydrate—this treatment ensures that your skin achieves a radiant glow by the time you leave the treatment bed.

The HydraFacial technology combines cleansing, exfoliation, extraction, hydration, and antioxidant protection, resulting in clearer, more hydrated skin with no discomfort or downtime. It’s designed to deliver immediate and long-lasting results.

The three steps:

1. Cleanse: The first step removes dead skin cells and excess oil, leaving your skin ready to absorb the nutrients from the following steps.
2. Extract: Using the HydraFacial’s vortex technology, this step provides painless extractions that clear out pores and remove blackheads.
3. Hydrate: A booster tailored to your skin concerns is applied, and antioxidants are layered on to provide protection and deep hydration.

How does a Hydrafacial work?

Hydrafacial treatments utilise a pen-like device with a vortex of water at its tip and a vacuum tube at the other end. This device cleanses, exfoliates, and performs lymphatic drainage, applying glycolic acid to soften pore blockages before vacuuming out the debris. This leaves the skin smoother and more receptive to a boost of vitamins, peptides, and moisturising hyaluronic acid. The treatment concludes with a few minutes of soothing red light to calm the skin and stimulate collagen production.

Depending on your skin’s needs, you can choose various steps, along with targeted Boosters from brands like Murad, ZO Skin Health, NassifMD, and Circadia.

Customisable boosters

What makes Hydrafacial even more special is the ability to customise your treatment with over 16 boosters, depending on your skin’s specific needs. Whether you’re targeting fine lines, wrinkles, or underlying inflammation, your Hydrafacialist will choose the right booster to address your concerns.

Advanced Vortex Technology

The HydraFacial’s patented vortex technology is what sets it apart from traditional facials. It uses water and a vacuum-based closed-loop system to cleanse, exfoliate, and infuse your skin with nutrients. Each step of the treatment employs a specially designed tip that maximises effectiveness, whether it’s cleansing, extracting, or hydrating your skin.

What are the benefits of a Hydrafacial? Is it worth it?

It’s quick and easy and gives great results. It’s like a deep cleansing ‘reset’ for the face. Skin is left looking very clean, fresh, glowing, and plumped up from the nourishing peptide and vitamin-rich solutions. One of the best things about Hydrafacial is how consistent the results are. This is helped massively by the machine itself, which is a high-tech feat of engineering and has been through endless testing to make it as efficacious as possible.

What’s the difference between a Hydrafacial and microdermabrasion?

A Hydrafacial provides a much gentler exfoliation than microdermabrasion. Both procedures will exfoliate the skin, but microdermabrasion does this by scouring off the top (dead) layer of skin, usually with a fine powder of crystals. The vortex technology used by Hydrafacial performs a gentler exfoliation, and as a treatment, a Hydrafacial goes further and adds a gentle acid peel, extraction of blocked pores and the infusion of serums into the treatment. There’s also a great deal more scope for customisation with Hydrafacial, which allows your practitioner to finely tune the procedure to cater to your precise needs.

How long does a Hydrafacial take?

The treatment itself takes about 45 minutes. If it’s your first session with a particular practitioner, add on another 15 minutes for an in-depth consultation. All in all, this is something you can easily do in an hour.

How long do Hydrafacial results last?

The glow lasts for several days, and the super-clean, super-fresh feeling lasts for around a week. It does leave you a little pink afterwards, so do this a day before a big event to give your skin time to calm right down.

How much does a Hydrafacial cost?

Expect to pay around £125 but depending on clinic/ practitioner location.

How often should you get a Hydrafacial?

Your skin will thank you if you get Hydrafacials regularly. For the best ongoing and long-term results, the brand recommends one every 2-3 months, but you’d still reap the rewards from one every 2-3 months or even the occasional Hydrafacial before a big event.

What happens during a Hydrafacial treatment?

If it’s your first appointment, you’ll have a consultation to establish what it is you’re looking to achieve from the Hydrafacial. This procedure can treat a wide range of concerns so your practitioner will want to get a good idea of what you’re trying to treat so they can tailor the session to you.

Then it’s into the chair. This may have ‘facial’ in the name, but it’s not like a day at the spa. It’s not painful at all, but it’s also not mega-relaxing. First, there’s the cleansing step, where all the nasty surface impurities are whisked away so that there’s nothing in the way for when the real work starts. Then it’s time for the hydra-dermabrasion portion of the treatment (that’s exfoliation to you or me) where the Hydrafacial pen is used to remove the very top layer of skin (don’t worry, this is made up predominantly of dead skin cells that you’re really not going to miss).

After that, a gentle peel is applied to the skin to soften up the impurities clogged up in your pores and the pen is used to hoover up all these impurities, simultaneously providing lymph drainage to remove toxins. Finally, the pen is used to infuse your newly exfoliated skin with serums that help to target your specific concern. Because of the preceding steps, these serums can penetrate up to 20 per cent deeper than usual, making them all the more effective.

Does Hydrafacial get rid of blackheads?

Hydrafacials are great for removing blackheads because of the thorough cleansing, exfoliation, and glycolic acid application that precedes the extraction process. This multi-step process enables the tool to remove blackheads efficiently and effectively.

Does Hydrafacial help acne?

The Hydrafacial is a great addition to your acne-fighting regimen. While the treatment of acne is usually a long-term process that often requires a combination of approaches, you can be sure that a Hydrafacial – which boils down to cleansing, exfoliation, extraction and application of specialised treatment serums – will always be a good move.

The only thing we’d say is to avoid going for a Hydrafacial in the middle of a severe breakout. The abrasive techniques are mildly irritating, so wait for your skin to calm down before going through that.

Is Hydrafacial right for sensitive skin?

Yes! Hydrafacial is suitable for all skin types, including sensitive skin. The treatment can be adjusted to cater to the sensitivity level of your skin, ensuring you achieve the best results without irritation. HydraFacial even offers a special “Peel Sensitive” option, using gentle exfoliants like lactobionic and phytic acids, making it ideal for more delicate skin.

Are there any side effects to Hydrafacials?

This is a minimally invasive treatment, but unless you have particularly hardy skin you should expect some pinkness straight afterwards. This is normal and nothing to worry about. Give it a day and you’ll be back to normal, just with much cleaner and healthier skin.

What is it like to have a HydraFacial?

Not pampering, so it’s not relaxing, but it’s extremely effective. It might sound a bit like putting your face through a high-speed car wash, but no, you don’t end up being hosed down — that clever vortex tip sucks the water back up as fast as it delivers it, so you don’t end up covered with water, serum, or exfoliating solution. It’s generally comfortable, although it can feel a little rough during extraction.

What’s the “Gunkie”?

One of the fun aspects of Hydrafacial is the “gunkie”—the jar that collects everything extracted from your skin. Dead skin cells, excess oil, and impurities are all captured here, and you can see firsthand what has been removed from your skin. It’s oddly satisfying, and the “gunk selfie” has become a popular trend among Hydrafacial enthusiasts.