The post-festival facial

Let’s face it – festivals are all about indulgence. There’s nothing like donning your finest pair of wellies for a weekend of music, revelry and general bad behaviour – but after the last band has finished their set, the tent is packed and you’re back in reality your skin might be feeling a little worse for wear. Late nights, fried food, alcohol and sleeping in your makeup (which are all festival prerequisites, by the way) are the worst enemies of a radiant complexion. In fact, we’ve even got a name for the numerous skin maladies you might be facing after a weekend under the canvas – Post Festival Face. Think grey skin, dark circles, a smattering of spots and a general tight, dry feeling – basically everything you don’t want. To get the remedy, we grilled Fiona Brackenbury, Decleor’s Education Director, on the Decleor Ultimate Vitamin Glow Facial. The facial combines deep cleansing with an application of a power-packed, botanical-rich serum to soothe and revitalise the skin. It also includes a professional-use-only mask supercharged with a heavenly blend of vitamins, minerals and omegas.

By Daniela Morosini

• 1 Kick off with a skin detox

  ‘Steaming is essential for post-festival complexions,’ says Fiona. Warm steam will gently open your pores, bringing all the nasties to the surface, and allowing your therapist to deeply clean your skin to squeaky-clean perfection. If you’ve had a troublesome breakout, your therapist might try extraction. Fiona explained, ‘When oil comes to the surface of the skin and meets oxygen in the air, it can get ‘stuck’ and turn into a blackhead. Your therapist will use a special, safe squeezing technique using tissues to unblock the pore.’ Consider this your first step in getting your skin back on track – it’ll give you a clean slate, free from congestion and make your skin ready to drink up some goodness.
• 2 Next, do some serious damage limitation

  Now is the time to throw as many skin-feeding omegas and vitamins as you can at your skin. ‘Omegas are essential to repair the damage you’ve done to your skin by sleeping in your make-up, while adding vitamins and minerals will feed the skin and give it all the nutrients it’s lacked during your weekend of hot dogs, candyfloss and cider’, Fiona told us. Omegas are clever fatty acids found in nature that help calm down your skin’s inflammatory responses and help smooth and soften the skin.
• 3 Now, make up for all that lost sleep

  Sleeping Beauty was on to something, believe us. As Fiona explained, ’Beauty sleep is no myth! A lack of sleep will show in the skin tone and any fine lines will appear more noticeable – particularly around the eyes and mouth. It’ll also affect your skin’s repairing process, and if you’ve been sleeping with makeup on, your pores will be clogged, which will likely cause breakouts.’ To remedy sleep-deprived skin, Fiona said the key is hydration, hydration, hydration. ‘There’s not much better than hyaluronic acid, which holds a thousand times its own weight in moisture. It works so quickly, which is perfect when the skin needs instant hydration to bring back the dewiness and the vitality to the skin.’ 

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