The Good:
- It's a smaller spa which meant it would be more intimate and less busy.
- I can finally see the skin on my legs now that the hairy monster has been stripped off!
- Everyone seemed nice and friendly.
- I had my first facial which left my skin glowing and the smoothest it's ever felt!
- I learned that my skin is in fairly good condition despite a few scars from blemishes. And my paranoid suspicions of sun damage were wrong (thank goodness) - my skin scars easily so the blemishes looked like dark sun spots. Need to get a microdermabrasion scrub to smooth out my bumps.
Facial was done with Dermalogica products. I've been wanting to try the brand and really liked it. My skin felt amazing and didn't make my skin breakout. Unfortunately, I fell asleep during the treatment lol and forgot to ask what products she used!
- I got my first parafin wax treatment on my hands and feet and a body polish scrub for free (drama begins...)!
I'm lovin' my orange-red tips from OPI called The Tasmanian Devil Made Me Do It!. Such a hot colour for Spring - too bad it's from an older collection but OPI's India collection has a similar colour called MonSooner Or Later!
The Bad:
- Eye lash tinting was a bad call on my part. My lashes are black already, but I thought the tinting would intensify the black even more. It doesn't - so not worth it if you already have dark lashes. And it burns like hell, something the esthetician just didn't bother to tell me.
- It's a smaller space which is good but bad if you're spending the day there and the only place to chill out and eat lunch is at the front in the waiting area! How awkward did I feel sitting there stuffing my face while women waited to get their nails done? Thank goodness I didn't stay in my robe or else I would have freezed to death sitting by the door!
- There was no communication between the different esthetician's working on me. The one who did my facial thought I was done for the day, my mani/pedi person thought I upgraded my manicure and pedicure to include the parafin wax and wanted the body polish scrub. I was pretty clueless when it came to what each service included. I didn't bother reading the brochure and thought the parafin was apart of the classic mani/pedi and that the body polish was a complimentary service. I even asked the girl and she said it was included in my package. I thought "sweet!".
- My package said it would be a 4 1/2 hr day but I was there for 8.5 hrs! The wait time between lunch and my next treatments was a 2.5 hr wait! It only took me 15 minutes to eat and the rest of the time I sat at the front reading old magazines. Not my idea of a "relaxing" time. Even with the long wait my appt. was still a half hour late!
- A friend of all the estheticians came in talking about her lovely cold sore. I think it's cool that women can come and get their nails done and dish about everything. But I just don't think it's professional for a so-called spa to have their friends stop in and talk about picking at their cold sore until it bleeds. It grossed me out.
- The icing on the cake: so after everything was done and added up I was charged $100 + over my gift certificate! I knew something went wrong when I got the body polish! Apparently the person who booked my appt. was the manager and she upgraded me to a Spa Mani/Pedi instead of the classic that came with my package and added a body polish scrub. She also made it seem like my lunch was included in my package and encouraged me to choose whatever I wanted. Little did I know that it was an additional $15! It's not expensive but it's the principle. I never asked for any of those services and figured she got my appt. mixed up with someone else. She tried to compromise by giving me a discount on the additional services so I would only pay $70. No way! I told her that I would pay for the services I asked for plus the lunch. I understood that the extra services were already done but since it was my first time there figured it was complimentary because why else would they be giving to me?? I even asked the esthetician to make sure it was included in my package and she said yes! I wasn't sure why it was taking the manager so long for her to minus the extra services but realized she was trying to figure out a way for me to still pay for them. She tried wording it different ways so I wouldn't catch on that I was still paying for a few extras but I stood my ground and said I will only pay $16 plus the lunch. She finally gave in and didn't even apologize for the mix-up. Her esthetician apologized though so I gave her a $20 for her troubles because I actually did like her.
- I left the "spa" feeling more stiff than before I got there! So much for a relaxing time!