A French Touch Salon

The finest in Parisian skin care on the central coast.

mechanical exfoliation

Discover Radiant Skin: New Jan Marini Holiday Exfoliators

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Bonjour, Mes Amis!

Welcome in the Holiday season with A French Touch at our Petite Soirée with Jan Marini Skin Research’s all new Sugar Cookie and Pumpkin Spice Holiday Scented Exfoliators!  

imageThese adorable, festive, limited-time Jan Marini products work to immediately refine skin texture and follicle size with Glycolic Acid, Proteolytic Enzymes, and Antioxidants, leaving skin with a radiant, polished glow.  The unique spherical beads are gentle of skin and reduce excessive abrasion commonly associated with exfoliating scrubs, polishing away loose or dead skin cells and removing debris that make the skin look dull to create a perfect, smooth canvas for make-up application on all skin types.  The benefits of exfoliation are great (click here to read all about them!), and the combination of gentle Mechanical Exfoliation, Enzymatic Exfoliation, and Hydroxy Acid Exfoliation intensifies the youthful, healthy glow of healthy and refreshed skin, partially by removing the dull top layer of skin cells that accumulates over time, and partially by enabling your other skin care products to penetrate and treat your skin more deeply through revitalized skin cells.  

This Holiday season, which we’ll be kicking off this Thursday with our colleague from Sothys, Caroline Rushmore, we’ll be offering the Sugar Cookie and Pumpkin Spice Holiday Exfoliators together at a buy-one-get-one-half-off price, getting you TWO festive, love-your-skin gifts for only $120 (you save $40, love those BOGO specials!).  The Holiday Exfoliators are just what you need for that little refreshing “me moment” that keeps us all going during the craziness of the Holidays, and make for the perfect stocking stuffer, too!

Be sure you stop by to sample both delicious scents, either when you join us for our Petite Soirée on Thursday (from 2 to 6pm, hors d’oeuvres, champagne, and raffle give-aways included!), or at your next appointment, which you can schedule online.  Either way, stay tuned for more fabulous Holiday specials all season long!

Bisous,

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Exfoliation, DIY Style!

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Bonjour, Mes Amis!

cs exfol

Alright, now you’re thinking “Jessie might be onto something with this whole exfoliation thing, but what should I do now?  Take a pumice stone to my face?”

First of all, please don’t use a pumice stone on your face!  Let me show you all of the fabulous products we have here to gently exfoliate your skin, leaving it glowing, not raw!

The Colorescience Family:

  • Colorescience’s Illuminating Cleanser incorporates tiny beads of natural minerals to help mechanically exfoliate your skin as you cleanse.  This product is perfect for removing your long-lasting mineral makeup, without being harsh on your skin!

The Sothys Family:

  • Sothys’ Desquacrem is the gentlest option, as it is granule-free and can be used several times a week.  This deep-pore cleanserphoto (3) dissolves oil, which facilitates the removal of blackheads to leave your skin feeling smooth and flawless. This exfoliant is often used under steam during the French facial protocol.
  • Sothys’ Gelée Gommante Visage (micro-gel peeling) is a newer exfoliant by Sothys, which uses exfoliating particles to remove the dull top layer. It transforms from a gel into an oil as you massage it in—perfectly luxurious, in typical Sothys fashion!  This product, too, is paraben free, and contains white tea extract to calm your skin.
  • Sothys’ Beauty Garden Gommage Exfoliant works well as a mechanical exfoliant, especially for sensitive skin.  The word “Gommage” actually comes from the word “gomme” which means ‘eraser’ in French; so to complete the analogy, this exfoliant uses all natural ingredients like finely ground walnut shells (no irritants for sensitive skin types!) to literally rub and erase away that dull top layer of skin!  As an added bonus, this product is paraben-free and eco-certified organic.

The Jan Marini Family:

  • Jan Marini’s SkinZyme Mask is an enzymatic exfoliant, which uses the proteolytic enzymes naturally found in green papaya, which serve to digest the top layer of dead skin cells and debris to reveal the healthy and fresh skin underneath.jm exfol
  • Jan Marini’s Bioglycolic products, which include the Bioglycolic Cleansers, Bioclear Face Cream, and Bioclear Face Lotion, all use a tame dosage of glycolic acid (only 12%, so you can use it daily for homecare) to chemically exfoliate your skin.  Glycolic acid gently dissolves the dull top layer, and is mild enough to let you start and finish your day feeling refreshed and renewed (those of you on the Skin Care Management System know what I’m talking about!)

Other Mechanical Exfoliators offered at A French Touch Salon:

  • Spacells:  “A revolutionary facial sponge that not only cleans and removes make-up, but exfoliates and massages your skin, stimulating blood and lymph flow to decrease puffiness, eliminate toxins and promote cellular regeneration. Use daily for softer, smoother, younger-looking skin.”
  • Clarisonic Brushes:  “Unlike spinning devices, this patented sonic cleansing technology works with skin’s natural elasticity, oscillating at a sonic frequency that produces over 300 movements per second. The resulting flexing action created between the outer and inner brushes works to loosen dirt and oil (and dead skin cells), removing deep-seated impurities from pores and priming skin to better absorb topical treatments.”

So, mes amis, you have a few options available at A French Touch, but whichever you choose, remember that incorporating exfoliation frequently and regularly into your skincare routine is essential for maintaining a healthy, youthful glow, and to maximize the benefits of your favorite products!  Tomorrow, come back and I’ll tell you all about the crème de la crème of exfoliation, our heavenly peels!

Bisous,

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Exfoliation: Smooth and Refresh your Skin

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Bonjour, Mes Amis!

I hope you’ve all had a lovely and relaxing weekend, and got to enjoy our extended summer weather a bit (wearing your sun protection, of course)!  I know that nothing leaves me feeling more refreshed and renewed like a long weekend of reading, relaxing, and doing nothing!  Which got me thinking, doesn’t my skin deserve a little time to refresh, too?

Young woman applying exfoliating gel to face, portrait, close-up

So, let’s talk about exfoliation!  We are all, no doubt, familiar with the concept of exfoliation (let’s face it, it’s not exactly new to the world of skin care!), but just to recap, Exfoliation is defined as the act of removing that top layer of dead skin cells and debris that we accumulate over time, which cause our skin to look dull and matte.  But I want to dig a little deeper.  How does one go about exfoliating?  As it turns out, we have three options:

  • Mechanical Exfoliation:  This implies the use of simple friction, by implementing either a tool (a brush, loofah, etc.) or a product with a coarse ingredient (sea salt, sugar, crystals, pumice, etc.) to knock this top layer loose and wipe it off of the skin beneath it.  This is the most basic form of exfoliation, and is an excellent step to incorporate into your weekly skin care regimen.
  • Enzymatic Exfoliation:  We borrow very specific enzymes (all natural proteins) from fruits like pineapple and papaya that are specially wired to break down and digest dead skin cells.  Unlike mechanical exfoliation, using enzymes to resurface your skin actually penetrates much deeper and works to clear debris out of your pores and deeper layers of your skin, as well.

exfol mask

  • Alpha or Beta Hydroxy Acid Exfoliation:  This may sound a bit scarier, but Acid Exfoliation uses naturally-derived acids, like Salicylic Acid (from willow tree bark), Lactic Acid (from milk), and Glycolic Acid (from sugarcane, and which many of us use in our Jan Marini Skin Care Management Systems, anyway!) to provide a deeper, more intensive form of exfoliation.  Similar to using enzymes, these acids (used in our peels and our home-care products) penetrate deep into the skin and pores to remove debris, while also stimulating the skin’s natural renewal cycle—your cellular turnover rate, which can slow with age—to stimulate cellular renewal on the skin’s surface. Glycolic peels have the added benefit of synthesizing collagen in the skin.

But, I have yet to mention the most important part: WHY should we exfoliate?

Exfoliation by itself can give your skin a youthful, healthy glow by removing the top layer of dead cells and debris, which makes your skin more luminous (because we see the living layer, full of natural oils, on top!) and provide a cleared path for oxygen to reach your living cells.  

Woman Applying Facial CreamHowever, exfoliation is, perhaps, even more important to your skin care regimen because it makes the other products you use—from moisturizing creams to anti-aging serums—more effective!

Yes, you read that right, it will enhance the benefits of your other products.  If you don’t exfoliate, the products you apply don’t always penetrate through that dead top layer, and therefore don’t do much for your skin.  However, removing this top layer regularly enables your products to penetrate the skin completely and really work their magic!  

Now that I’ve told you how wonderful exfoliation is for you, check back with me tomorrow to see what products we have at A French Touch to give your skin that easy, at-home renewal it needs!  Then on Thursday, I’ll send you off into your weekend daydreaming about our refreshing and anti-aging peels!

Alors, à bientôt!

Bisous,

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