When I visit Neville the salon is barely recognisable - you literally can’t see in through the windows, which are so murky with building dust that I double-check the address. Maybe it’s moved?  But inside, the clients don’t seem to care and it’s business as usual, besides, they’re enjoying the newly distressed brickwork and the black, shiny floors.  It’s all very NYC, and if Manhattan is the spiritual home of grooming then Neville, and its beautiful home in Pont Street, Knightsbridge, must be its church.  The client who worships  here has a signature look that is celebrated amongst a certain type of woman. Neville’s typical customer is very similar to  Elena Lavagni, the beautiful Italian who runs things here.  Her skin is translucent, healthy, glowing; her hair is blow-dried to perfection, by which I mean she doesn’t look like an Ambassador’s wife, but still looks groomed. Most of all, her smile is beaming. You can’t help but want whatever she’s having; I scan her face for signs of work, but can’t see anything. 

I’m here primarily to meet Vanda Serrador, a facialist who has been getting rave reviews amongst the beauty editors. It’s hard to put Vanda in a box of any kind - she’s not into invasive procedures and doesn’t do Botox, but neither is she a purist, the kind who religiously uses only organic, home-made remedies and throws in a bit of Reiki at the end.   Her facial doesn’t deviate from the classic model - she cleanses, she scrubs, she extracts.  Even the products she favours are all over the place - a bit of Creme de la Mer, lots of Yon-Ka, and she is partial to Chanel skincare as well. I’ve never met anyone - professionally speaking - with such a hotch-potch mix of products. 

But it’s the hands that make her special.   (It’s always the hands - Eve Lom, Sarah Chapman.. they’re hands-on facialists too).  At one point, as Vanda massages my face, I’m not sure, but I think I feel heat.  Maybe it is reiki after all, maybe she has healing, magical powers,  until I realise it’s a hot stone she is dextrously passing from hand to table to face without my even noticing a changeover.  The effect is not just relaxing; this, coupled with a tool she uses to vacuum the skin thereby stimulating circulation, leaves my face glowing, radiant, a bit like Elena’s. 

I notice that most of the facialists I come across, the really talented ones, seem to have had challenging lives, lives which could have gone in different directions had they not had the strength of character to get over their problems and move forward.   I’m sure that’s not unique to facialists, perhaps it’s something anyone with a talent, or a desire to succeed has to battle with in order to fulfil their goals, but at one point, while chatting to Vanda, I feel her falter before she answers my question:  ”What made you become a facialist?”  

“I had an accident at 17,” she says, a sadness passing over her for a second.  ”My face was paralysed.”  I have some experience of this because something similar happened to a very dear friend of mine.  But with the support of her brother, Vanda learnt to stimulate the circulation in her face and improve the muscle action.  ”Look at this side of my face,” she says, and I open my eyes and look up.  ”I can make it move more than some people who’ve had Botox!” she smiles.  

Her brother helped her develop a small vacuum machine, not dissimilar in principle to the one she uses now on clients, and every day she would exercise her face until she began to see some signs of improvement.  I’m guessing that’s where the desire to help others with their skin came from; plus experiencing change in her own face must have made her realise she had a talent to nurture and lots of experience to put to good use.  ”At the time I was angry I didn’t get compensation,” she admits.  ”But now, I look back and realise it’s what brought me to this.” 

It’s all food for thought.  Afterwards I sit in front of the mirrors downstairs for a blow-dry by Liz (who I really recommend for that bouncy Elle MacPherson look as she has that nailed).   I spot Yasmin Le Bon leaving the salon, her face gleaming from a facial.  Neville Tucker, the founder and one of the first “celebrity” hairdressers,  is on the stairs sweeping up and we make the standard joke about not being able to get the staff these days.  And as I leave, I say goodbye to Elena, and I notice something that brings a sparkle to my smile: I’ve got her skin now. 

http://www.nevillehairandbeauty.net/