About the treatment
Why we stopped squeezing
For decades a deep-cleansing facial meant steam, a metal loop and somebody pressing on your face. It worked, after a fashion, and it left skin red, sometimes bruised and occasionally worse than it started. A Hydro Facial does the same job by pulling instead of pushing.
Fluid and a controlled vacuum run through one handpiece. The fluid softens what has hardened inside the pore, the vacuum draws it out, and both happen at a pressure your esthetician sets rather than one your skin has to absorb. Nothing is forced through the follicle wall, which is the mechanism behind most of the damage manual extraction causes.
That is why we book it for people who have been told their skin is too reactive for extractions. At our Ranchlands Boulevard clinic in northwest Calgary it is the treatment that most often gets a client back to having facials at all.
The appointment
Four stages, and what each one is actually for
The tip on the handpiece changes between stages. Skipping any of them makes the ones after it less effective, which is why the order is fixed.
Cleanse and resurface
A textured tip lifts the dead surface layer. This is unglamorous groundwork rather than the visible part of the treatment, but nothing underneath can be reached until it is done.
Loosen
A mild acid solution goes over the skin to soften the plug of oil and dead cells inside each pore. It sits for a short time and does not sting the way a peel does, because it is not there to exfoliate the surface.
Draw out
The vacuum stage, and the one clients want to watch. Whatever has been loosened leaves the pore intact. Ask to see the canister afterwards if you have the stomach for it; most people do and then book a second appointment.
Put back
Serums are delivered through the same handpiece into skin that is finally able to take them. Which serums depends on what the first three stages revealed rather than on what was decided before you arrived.
Why here
Skin that spends its weekends at altitude
Our corner of Calgary is the one people leave from on a Friday afternoon. That has consequences for a face, and they show up in our Monday bookings.
Snow is a mirror
A day on a hill west of here delivers ultraviolet from above and again off the snow, at an elevation where there is less atmosphere to filter it. People come back with colour on their face in February and are genuinely surprised by it.
Wind does the rest
Chairlifts, trailheads and the exposed ground around Nose Hill all involve standing in moving cold air. Skin responds by thickening its surface layer, which is precisely the layer that then makes everything look dull and feel rough.
Cabins and wood heat
A weekend in dry heated air, often with a stove going, takes water out of the skin faster than a city apartment does. Oil production rises to compensate, and congestion follows about a week later.
Monday is the right day to fix it
We are open weekdays, which suits this particular problem well. A facial at the start of the week resets what the weekend did, rather than leaving it to compound into the next one.
Indications
What is it good for?
Congested, dehydrated, dull skin, and skin that reacts badly to everything more aggressive.
Where the surface is flaking rather than congested, dermaplaning often does more, and for tone and pigment an AFA peel is the better route. Everything we offer in northwest Calgary is on our Calgary NW clinic page.
Making it count
Three habits that decide what you get out of a course
The appointment is an hour. The other seven hundred hours between appointments are doing more than we are, and here they matter more than in a humid climate.
Stop over-exfoliating at home
The commonest mistake we see. An acid toner, a scrub and a retinol on top of a monthly facial is not a routine, it is a barrier under sustained attack. Cut one of them and your skin will look better, not worse.
Wear sunscreen through the winter
Almost nobody here does, and at this elevation with snow on the ground it is the single highest-value thing on this page. Pigment you accumulate in February is pigment we will be trying to treat in June.
Keep a rhythm rather than a burst
Three facials in three consecutive weeks before an event does less than one a month for six months. Turnover happens on its own schedule and cannot be hurried by paying more attention to it.
Getting ready
Pre & post treatment
Very little is asked of you. What there is concerns actives beforehand and sun afterwards.
In the days before
- Retinol and acids down for three days. Skin already thinned by them will exfoliate further than we intend.
- No facial waxing or threading in the week either side.
- Tell us if you have been in the mountains, or anywhere with sun on snow, in the last fortnight.
- Come without make-up if you can — otherwise removing it simply uses up your appointment.
- Mention cold sores and any acne medication, current or in the last six months.
Afterwards
- A little pink for a short while, then nothing. Make-up the same day is fine.
- Sunscreen before you leave the building, January included. This is not optional at this elevation.
- Nothing active for two or three days. A plain moisturiser is the most useful thing in your cupboard that week.
- Skip the hot tub, the sauna and hard training for a day.
- A small spot or two in the following days is congestion surfacing, not a reaction to the treatment.
Results
Hydro Facial before and after
A You Glow Aesthetics client, same lighting in both frames. The honest place to look is the texture across the cheek and around the nose, not the general brightness.
Where any individual ends up depends on the state of the skin at the start, how congested it was and what happens between appointments. One session changes clarity and texture; the rest builds across a series.
Also on Ranchlands Boulevard
Treatments that pair well with this one
- Dermaplaning in Calgary NW — usually done immediately before, so the clearing stage reaches deeper
- AFA Chemical Peel in Calgary NW — for tone and pigment rather than congestion
- Red Light Therapy in Calgary NW — added at the end to calm and support the skin
- Face and Neck Tightening in Calgary NW — when firmness rather than clarity is the concern
- Blue Ice HydroFacial brand-wide — how the treatment works across all our clinics
