SAVING FACE

The relationship between beauty and technology is a marriage made in wrinkle-free, collagen-stimulated, deeply hydrated heaven. In Asia we often look to Korea for high-tech beauty breakthroughs, but there’s a brand coming out of the US that is using tech to turn heads and transform complexions.

Georgia Louise Vassanelli fell in love with the beauty industry as a child. Originally from the UK, she crossed the pond and touched down in New York to setting up her Georgia Louise Atelier on Manhattan’s swish Upper East Side. She quickly became one of the Big Apple’s most sought-after facialists with a client list of stars like Cate Blanchette, Emma Stone, Amy Schumer, Jennifer Lawrence, Christy Turlington and Anna Wintour.

Her fast track into Hollywood who’s who happened thanks to her expertise and her first client, Linda Evangelista. The supermodel simply needed her galvanic machine fixing, but by the time Vassanelli finished showing her how to best use the fixed device, Evangelista was a big fan. So big she’s godmother to Vassanelli’s children — and the rest is Hollywood history.

Vassanelli is clearly far more than an unbelievably young, fresh-looking face. Her knowledge of skin and beauty devices— think LED, micro-current, radio frequency, oxygenation, galvanic—is encyclopaedic and her skincare brand Georgia Louise is chock full of results-driving ingredients, allowing her to create spontaneously tailored treatments that change according to her clients’ complexions every visit.

She reveals that celebs and socialites are just as obsessed with anti-ageing as the rest of us mere mortals, and have no time for downtime, so she works hard to tread the fine line between aggression and overstimulation. “They don’t want to be papped with red skin!” Vassanelli laughs.

To keep clients on track between treatments, Vassanelli creates personalised regimes for her clients and is super-strict about them following them. She says this benefits them as much as her. “I love to see results, to see growth and changes in the skin, it’s the best satisfaction I get,” she says.

It’s not only Vassanelli’s hands-on treatments (and those of her intensively trained Atelier team) that result in skin improvements. Her pioneering spirit has led to some game-changing devices for the home too.

Newly launched is Vassanelli’s Pure Molecule 32 Nightly, four active concentrations that are freeze dried (down to -50ºC) and vacuum-sealed in tablet form. They are brought back to life when mixed with eight drops of the accompanying Pure Activator. The technology allows the tablets to hold the equivalent of up to five bottles of 30ml two per cent hyaluronic acid per tablet — a potent dose of overnight hydration.

The 32 Nightly regime guides clients on a 32-night journey, with a new focus every week, including hydrating with hyaluronic acid, rebuilding with synthetic EGF (Epidermal Growth Factor), boosting suppleness via collagen for elasticity, and brightening and protecting with pure vitamin C. The combination is arguably ideal for the modern lifestyle — effective, easy and also travel-friendly.

Last year Vassanelli’s GLoPulse headset hit the market. A hands-free, high-tech beauty device for at-home use and to be worn while multitasking — driving, working or watching a movie. When the sleek white headset is worn over one of her specially designed conductor sheet masks (full of actives for brightening, hydrating or combination skin) it emits a tingly galvanic current that gently pushes the formulation into the skin.

“This is the first generation of wearable beauty technology,” Vassanelli says. “Every single ingredient will penetrate into the dermis, it won’t just sit there on the skin. The Galvanic uses negative and positive ions and the sheet mask is ion-charged, in order to help push product into the skin.”

The GLoPulse machine is one of the steps in her AngelGlo facial, originally designed for Victoria’s Secret angels no less, and both are available at Le SPA’Tique at The Parisian Macao, the Bodhi Spa at the Conrad Macao and the newly launched V Retreat at The Venetian Macao.