At the recently opened Ever/
Body in downtown New
York City, where Clear + Brilliant laser facials
are offered alongside Botox injections,
jade-colored walls provide the backdrop for
potted plants and stacks of Assouline books.
It’s chic, relaxed, and bears little resemblance
to a traditional doctor’s office.
Just a few years ago, laser treatments like
this one—that target uneven texture
and pigmentation with 1,440 nanometers
of light—were rarely available outside
whitewashed clinical
spaces; now, similar high-
tech devices are becoming
household names.
If you recognize “Pico
Genesis” and “IPL” from
regular appearances
on Instagram—not to
mention subway ads,
sidewalk sandwich boards,
and dinner conversations
—you’re not alone. “We’re
leveraging technology in
all areas of our lives,” says
Kate Twist, a former
executive at Clinique and
the CEO and cofounder of
Ever/Body. “Why should
skin care be any different?”
This new fluency with
lasers that do everything from reduce
fine lines and acne scars to repair broken
capillaries and erase sun spots is part of
a larger burgeoning interest in all cosmetic
procedures, according to Anne Chapas,
M.D., the founder of New York’s Union
Square Laser Dermatology. “There’s more
awareness about lasers because of social
media, so we’ve seen a huge uptick in patients
in their 20s and 30s coming in before
they even have visible signs of aging,” says
Chapas. The noninvasive devices’ efficacy,
courtesy of deep-penetrating beams of light
that kick-start collagen production, and their
minimal-to-no downtime (varying degrees
of swelling, redness, and peeling are typically
resolved in a few days) haven’t been lost on
the aesthetics bars that have recently sprouted
up across the country, offering affordable
Botox injections and fillers with laser add-ons.
At Benefit Cosmetics Boutique in San
Francisco you can now get brow services and
a “collagen reshaping,” during which a
registered nurse will use a
YAG 1064 laser to target
fine lines and dark spots
with a wavelength of up to
1,064 nanometers. It’s only
$75 per session (four to six
sessions are recommended
every two to four weeks),
and you can bundle it
with a brow wax for just
under $100.
“The downside of people
hearing about lasers
everywhere is that they
seem like they’re not
serious medical procedures,
when in fact they are,”
cautions dermatologist
Elizabeth Tanzi, M.D.,
who keeps Fraxel—an ideal
device for treating dark spots and acne —on
heavy rotation at her office near Washington,
D.C. “They shouldn’t be treated like a
haircut”—or even a filler injection, continues
Tanzi, noting that a laser wielded incorrectly
can cause everything from blisters and burns
to hyper- and hypopigmentation, a particular
concern for women of color. New York
dermatologist Rosemarie Ingleton, M.D.,
sees many patients with darker skin tones
who are left with scars or white marks that
are difficult to get rid of, due to poorly
administered lasers. “Sometimes it’s difficult
to decipher someone’s true
LIGHT YEARS
LASER TREATMENTS ARE LEAVING THE DOCTOR’S
OFFICE, ELICITING INTEREST AND WORDS OF CAUTION.
SKIN CARE
Bridging
the Zap
Before the summer
sun makes laser
procedures verboten,
’tis the season
for brightening and
tightening.
S K I N CA R E >76
74 APRIL 2020 VOGUE.COM
WARREN DU PREEZ AND NICK THORNTON JONES/TRUNK ARCHIVE
VLIFE
