Anyone who visits Paris knows the City of Light offers some of the world’s best shopping. But, when all is said and done, what’s really needed is a café au lait and some relaxation — and nothing says bien-être like a really fine facial, where all of the stress in your face melts into nothingness. I scoured the city in search of the best Parisian skincare salons to find my passport to healthier-looking skin. Here are some of the most luxurious and best Parisian skincare salons you won’t want to miss.
The Spa At The Four Seasons Hotel George V
One of the best — and perhaps the world’s most expensive — facial treatments (which I like to call “Swiss Bliss”) comes at the Four Seasons Hotel George V, close to the Champs Elysees and Avenue Montaigne. The spa’s Haute Couture Facial, part of the Swiss-based Dr. Burgener skincare program, includes a thorough skin analysis, a high-end scientific facial, a box of luxurious and bespoke beauty products, and prices around €7,200.
The facial is offered in tandem with Dr. Pauline Burgener (she holds a Ph.D. in Biology) and her medical-aesthetic clinic in Lausanne — the B-MediC — which specializes in preventive and regenerative medicine, dermatology, plastic surgery, state-of-the-art facials and body treatments, nutrition programs, and sports coaching, all in synergy under one roof. The clinic is so famous and renowned that it partners with many iconic, five-star hotels around the world, including several more Four Seasons in prime destinations, as well as Six Senses Spa in Gstaad, and the Shangri-La in Hong Kong.
In Paris, the facial begins with a one-on-one, 45-minute detailed skin evaluation, during which an expert from the Dr. Burgener Clinic takes measurements and obtains information about your skin’s moisture, sebum, the volume of wrinkles, pigmentation, skin elasticity, facial aging, and texture. Immediately, the information is put into a software program and connected to the clinic in Lausanne, where Dr. Burgener and her team (including a plastic surgeon and dermatologist) take two to three days to perform an analysis. For the next week, they work to create personalized, customized, luxury skincare products specifically made for your skin. Three to four weeks later, your Haute Couture Dr Burgener products are delivered to the George V — or directly to your home. These gorgeous goodies include posh proprietary blends of booster, eye and lip contour creams, micellar solution, cleansing milk, hydra-filler masks, and sunscreen.
The treatment also includes a 1.45-hour customized facial; its components can include an ultrasound regeneration, diamond microdermabrasion, draining massage, radio frequency, and no-needle mesotherapy, which Dr. Burgener says, “Pushes all the vitamins and hyaluronic acid into the skin. During the facial, our Vector serum and our Booster cream will prepare, balance, and restore your skin for the Haute Couture products.”
The visit can also include a hair analysis to determine the excess of heavy metals, and the deficit in minerals and trace elements, including iron, calcium, potassium, selenium, and zinc. Nutritional supplements are then specially produced for you at the clinic.
(The skin analysis is €1,495; the hair analysis of heavy metals and trace elements is €700; the Haute Couture treatment is €1,270, and personalized Dr. Burgener Haute Couture skincare products are €4,500).
Le Spa Clarins & myBlend at Le Royal Monceau – Raffles Paris
Designed entirely by Philippe Starck, Le Royal Monceau’s spa — called Le Spa Clarins & myBlend — offers contemporary but also timeless luxury. Said Philippe Starck, “A spa is above all a feminine place and for it. I wanted to investigate the architectural possibilities of the feminine unconscious.”
The spa features a watsu pool, hammam, ice fountain, sauna, and seven rooms, with treatments administered by “Beauty Coaches.” Just what you’d expect at one of Paris’ best skincare salons, n’est-ce pas. Here, guests exclusively enjoy the groundbreaking new concept myBlend, devised by Dr. Olivier Courtin-Clarins, managing director of Clarins Group and founder of the myBlend brand. It is a range of customized treatments, high-tech tools, and highly concentrated products for visible results with the greatest respect for your skin and the planet.
The bestselling, most luxurious treatment is the Youth Expert facial (€195 for one hour). After a thorough skin diagnosis, the personalized treatment adapts to your skin’s needs — from stressed skin that lacks firmness to skin weakened by hormonal changes. This treatment visibly reduces the look of fine lines and also smooths, features, and promotes a refreshed result. Numerous Clarins skincare products are used in the facial, each tailored to the guest for optimized results. However, the treatment highlights the brand’s best-selling Double Serum, formulated with 21 potent plant extracts — including age-defying turmeric — to visibly firm, smooth, and boost skin’s radiance.
“By distilling 65 years of professional experience into every single treatment, we achieve outstanding results by combining highly efficacious, plant-enriched formulas with our ‘Clarins,” says Sylvie Sola, global training director. These are unique-to-us techniques that optimize the rebalancing power of our therapist’s hands.”
Fauchon Le Beauty Spa
For ultimate foodies or those wishing to have their own Emily in Paris style experience, visit Fauchon L’Hotel Paris, designed with savvy women in mind. Modern in its hot pink, black, white, and gold hues, Fauchon L’Hotel Paris is nothing like your typical Parisian palace-style property. Guestrooms feature pink velvet chairs reminiscent of macarons, while plates of the delicate Parisian treat are found throughout the hotel, available to nibble at any time. Macarons and fruit teas — all from Fauchon, the chic Paris food shop (in Galeries Lafayette) — are also offered following treatments in the Beauty Spa, renowned for its specialty facial created by the Institut Esthederm (cellular water is used in all of its skincare products.) The 2.5-hour (€350) “Exceptional Beauty Spa x Institut Esthederm Ritual” begins with a skin diagnosis and 20-minute skin prep, with gentle cleansing that includes makeup removal, exfoliation, and application of a grain-free exfoliating mask. A 7-minute booster featuring an anti-aging serum, 10-minute “Smooth and Relax, and 25-minute “Deep Treatment” using lift-and-repair eye contour patches and a mask specially adapted to individual facial needs, follows. The treatment culminates with a 30-minute, firm-and-resculpt session using special serums and creams. The result? Your face is rested, features are smoothed and luminous, and accumulated tension is gone.
MO by Faucheur
The “M” and “O” stand for Margot and Othilie Denarie, two sisters — and their mother, Aline Faucheur — who have created a luxurious Paris skincare salon at Faucheur Paris that garnered mountains of positive press right from the start. Margot told me: “Our skincare salon is a family affair, and we are experts on facial massage called Kobido. Each facial massage is ‘sur measure’ and adapted to each client.”
From the moment you enter, the location is very cocooning, chic, and bohemian, she said, and soon the company will relocate to a modern loft in the 17th arrondissement that is 10 minutes from the Arc de Triomphe. The bestselling and most-talked-about treatment here is the Kobido L’Incontournable (€150), a natural lifting, authentic, and effective facial massage designed to restore freshness to the face. Kobido massage — for the uninitiated —is a stimulating Japanese technique that combines massage and aesthetic care and is said to produce a rejuvenating effect. Kobido massage allows the therapist to act simultaneously on the nervous system, using acupressure techniques performed on the skull and the periphery of the eyes, the blood, and the muscular system. A drainage technique with a bamboo stick can also be used. The technique promotes circulation to the face, neck, and the entire body, while releasing muscle tension, thereby reducing the appearance of wrinkles.
Other skincare lines used at the salon include Mimetique, Talm (for women before, after, and during pregnancy), Gaiame, and Tata Harper, an acclaimed American brand (made in Vermont), famous for its natural and non-toxic ingredients.
Featured image courtesy of Fauchon L’ Hotel Paris
