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After Hours: Holiday Spa Treatments
Whether you need a treatment to help you look great for the holiday parties – or recover after them – there is a spa for you.
by Mary Welch
October 25, 2007
The holidays are a time of joy - and stress. First, there are the season's parties - where looking
your best is a must. And, that of course, causes stress, which means you won't look your best. It's
an endless cycle, unless you go to your favorite spa for a special treatment.
Here's a rundown of some of our favorites, along with a treatment perfect to help you look
your best and de-stress.
Spa Sydell: Spa Sydell is offering Massage Stretch™, an exclusive massage therapy
combining assisted stretch and compression. A fusion of Chinese, Tibetan, Indian, Burmese, Thai and
sports massage techniques, Massage Stretch™ is designed to improve agility, and flexibility.
Massage Stretch™ is the first of many therapeutic treatments being offered in Spa Sydell's
massage relief program, a collection of massage services focusing on techniques to relieve stress,
chronic conditions and injuries and to enhance overall well-being.
According to Adrian Carr, certified massage therapist and Spa Sydell's massage training
instructor, "Massage Stretch™ is about making people feel better and actually enhancing performance
whether you are a professional athlete, a budding golfer, or a yoga enthusiast."
Spa Sydell has locations in Buckhead, Gwinnett, Alpharetta, the Perimeter, Park Place,
Midtown, Cumberland Mall and Norcross. Spa Sydell is celebrating its 25th anniversary. For more
information, call 404.255.7727 or go to
www.spasydell.com.
Natural Body Salon & Shoppe: Natural Body offers a 30-minute mini-facial that is
perfect as a holiday pick-me-up.
"It's great for a big event, especially when you don't have the time," says Heather Schardan,
aesthetician. "You get a lot for the time and money, but it avoids things like a corrective peel,
extractions or microdermabrasions - things that can leave unexpected or unwanted results,
such as redness or other reactions. Before an event it's better not to try something new on your
face."
The $50 treatment starts with an exfoliation followed by a massage. "By massaging the skin,
you help it detox as well as stimulate the circulation," she says. "It gives you a natural glow to
your skin." Next comes one of four customized masks: regenerative, deep cleansing, hydrating
or cryogenic.
Natural Body has 11 locations throughout metro Atlanta. Its website is
www.naturalbody.com.
Derma-Luxe: As the first skin care center in the city to offer the Caviar
Cyrogenic Facial ($325 for 90 minutes), Derma-Luxe harnesses caviar's essential minerals and
healing properties in a naturally derived customized facial. The gel mask by Atlanta-based SeSDERMA
helps regenerate and revitalize cutaneous tissue, hydrates the skin, stimulates cell metabolism and
improves vascular function and circulation.
"This treatment is great for mature, dull skin," says Aesthetician Kathleen Denney. "It
leaves skin looking radiant, especially the following day."
Cyrogenic refers to the addition of nutrient-rich algae harvested from the ocean. "Algae
helps pull out toxins, reduce inflammation, and it has antibacterial properties," Denney adds. "It
addresses conditions from acne to aging."
For more information, go to
www.derma-luxe.com. Derma-Luxe is located
at 3077 East Shadowlawn Ave., Atlanta, 404.816.6006; or 6111 Peachtree Dunwoody Road, Building E,
Suite 202, Sandy Springs, 770.351.0303.
The Spa at Four Seasons Hotel Atlanta: What's more perfect for the holidays than a
chocolate truffle treatment? The 80-minute, $210 treatment is a sensory delight featuring all
natural products. It starts with a sour cherry masque, which is perfect for more mature skins,
followed by either a whipped apricot or whipped sour cherry hydration moisturizer and facial
massage. The body also gets pampered with a cranberry sugar scrub. "The cranberry just adds extra
exfoliation and radiance to the skin," says Toni Maggiore, spa and fitness director. Next comes a
chocolate truffle body wrap for hydration, followed by a mini-massage.
"All the products are 100 percent organic and are from Hungary," Maggiore says. "It's all so
yummy, and it's a strong sensory experience. It's soothing and comforting and luxurious. And you
look and feel great."
The Spa at the Four Seasons Hotel is located at 75 14th St., Atlanta. Telephone:
404.881.9898.
Mila European Spa: The holidays certainly are a time to enjoy wine, but at Mila
European Spa, wine is used as a beauty treatment as well as a way to get rid of bloating and extra
holiday toxins. The weight management deluxe treatment features a 15-minute sauna, which burns 250
calories, followed by a one-hour lymphatic drainage massage using d'vine vinotherapy massage oil. A
wine salt glow is next, followed by a 10-minute steam shower. Finishing touches include a firming
d'vine shiraz body cream and a d'vine zinfandel scrub mask.
Mila uses a new product line, d'vine, which features wine and grape seed extracts along with
wine phytoalexins and resveratrol. These are designed to support the capillaries, stimulate
collagen synthesis, act as an antioxidant and promote tissue elasticity. The product line includes
cleansers, exfoliators, serums, moisturizers, eye treatments and body items.
Mila European Spa is located at 3167 Peachtree Road N.E. For more information, call
404.233.2588 or go to its website,
www.milaeuropeanspa.com.
Neem Tree Spa: Neem Tree Spa is the first and only spa in Atlanta that is based on
the Ayurvedic principles, an ancient system of health care native to the Indian subcontinent. The
principles involve a combination of physical, mental, social and spiritual harmony.
A favorite Neem Tree Spa offering is its amrut snan (milk and honey bath) treatment. This
unique treatment starts with a relaxing 60-minute sushupti, an Ayurevedic massage using oils
and ancient rejuvenation techniques, that invites the body to relax itself from the inside out. A
milk and honey bath follows that leaves the body soft and supple.
"We like to think that people envision that they are in a cultural haven from another time
and another place," says Managing Director Clea Calloway. "With our treatments, it's all about
rediscovering your inner tranquility and attaining sanctuary of the mind and body."
Neem Tree Spa is located at 1198-B Howell Mill Road. For more information go to
www.neemtreespa.com, or call 404.351.8446.
Macy's/Ecotage Day Spa and Salon: Let Macy's start or finish your holiday season
with its exclusive Ultimate Escape, which is a customized package designed to let you relax and
reconnect. The Ultimate Escape package takes place in the store's state-of-the-art day spa at
Macy's in Lenox Square. It is a quiet, secluded area with relaxing music and aromatherapy oils to
relax your senses.
The Ultimate Escape package allows your body and spirit to indulge in a full day of
relaxation. You will begin your escape with a hydrotherapy tub treatment and continue with a
moisturizing body polish and wrap, relaxing massage, customized facial and a spa pedicure and
manicure. During your ultimate spa experience you will enjoy a complimentary spa cuisine.
The direct line for the spa is 404.231.2688.
Honey Nail Salon & Boutique: A relative newcomer to the scene, Honey's signature
pedicures all feature its organic honey sugar scrub. To help freshen up tired feet from holiday
shopping and partying, owner Holly Reeves LaCascia suggests a $50 Worker Bee pedicure featuring the
honey sugar scrub as well as an additional 10-minute massage of the feet and lower legs. The
treatment starts with a hot towel treatment, followed by the scrub.
"The honey sugar scrub is a great exfoliate of dead skin, and it opens up the skin so that
when we massage in the essential oils, it really penetrates the skin. All the icky stuff is gone,
and your feet are incredibly soft." A new add-on is a pumpkin patch mask, which she says works
wonders.
Honey Nail Salon & Boutique is located at 442 East Paces Ferry Road. The phone number is
404.816.8340. The website is
www.honeynails.com.
BLUE MedSpa: The popular Midtown spa recommends trying to look great before the
holidays with a new laser liposuction surgery, Smarterlipo Laser Body Sculpting, the most recent
innovation from Cynosure, a worldwide leader in the surgical medical and aesthetic pulsed-light and
laser marketplace.
"The Smarterlipo Laser Body Sculpting Workstation is ideal for treating small areas,
especially for patients who have localized fat deposits but very lax overlying skin, which would
have been made worse by traditional liposuction," explains Dr. Bruce E. Katz, clinical professor,
Mt. Sinai School of Medicine. "So, in addition to melting that fat, the Smarterlipo
coagulates and tightens the tissue and induces collagen production," he adds.
For more information on the Cynosure Smarterlipo LaserBody Sculpting System and
laser-assisted Lipolysis procedures, please call BLUE MedSpa at 404.815.8880, or go to the website,
www.bluemedspa.com.
