Forget cucumbers. Vommuli caviar facial combines the luxury of one of the most expensive ingredients per pound with the aquatic essence of fish to make a beauty treatment quintessentially fitting the Maldives luxury property.
Best of the Maldives: MediSpa – Heritance Aarah
The pandemic COVID testing has introduced at least medical testing procedures to most resorts, but Heritance Aarah has extended medical grade procedures to its spa menus with an innovative range of diagnostics (see photo at bottom) and treatments.
A few examples include:
- “Aesthetics – State of the art diagnostic scanning to pinpoint problems, allowing effective prescription of remedial medical aesthetic treatments. Reverse signs of ageing, reduce appearance of fine lines and resolve pigmentation problems. When you want to feel younger than the mirror is telling you, we have the solution.”
- “Medical Assessment – Unique predictive software provides the most comprehensive medical assessments test to detect current health conditions and evaluates future disease risk to drive prevention that will increase your health span, as well as your lifespan.”
Other procedures include “nanoneedling” and “microneedling” for facials as well as “HIFU (High Intensity Focused Ultrasound)” for skin conditioning (“HIFU” is indeed a medical technique and in one of my previous day jobs heading up a med-tech company, we worked with HIFU for prostate cancer ablation).
The “Non-Surgical Facelift and Contouring” is also distinguished as possibly being the most expensive spa treatment available in the Maldives:
- Upper Face Lift 60 min – $ 300.00
- Double Chin Reduction 60 mins – $ 500.00
- Mid Face Lift 90 mins – $ 800.00
- Full Face Lift 120 mins – $1000.00
- Full Face and Neck Lift 150 mins – $1500.00
Aarah is certainly putting the “treatment” into spa treatments.
Best of the Maldives: Over-Water Beauty Therapy – Jumeirah Maldives
In the early years, the “spa” was relegated to some small rooms in sequestered in the middle of the island. With the rise of wellness tourism, resorts brought the spas front and centre to the main stage of the destination – over water. Now, an over-water spa common fare among the five-star Maldives properties. And yet, within the spas themselves, the massages are the main event and most of the treatments rooms are designed and reserved for the treatments. The spas will often feature beauty treatments – eg. facials, manicures, pedicures – but they are most often found near the entrance with a limited ocean view. But, the Jumeirah Maldives spa gives the aestheticians the same pride of place as the masseuses with an over-water room with floor-to-ceiling windows on 3 sides. Good looking out for those getting their looks good.
I’ve realized with this post that I need an “Over Water” tag for all those over water treats (but keeping the overwater villa features separate).
Best of the Maldives: Aesthetician – Vakkaru
Many top Maldivian resort spas host visiting yoga instructors and others who run special classes, but visiting practitioners are less common and I’ve not yet come across a resident aesthetician like Vakkaru’s Merana Spa is featuring:
- “Vakkaru Maldives welcomed UK-based aesthetic practitioner Daisy Whitear to the resort for a short-term beauty residency. With over 30 years of experience within the medical aesthetic and beauty industry, the founder of Wilbury Clinic has a lifelong professional mission to help people feel beautiful both inside and out.”
You’ve come all this way for the perfect selfie backdrop so it makes sense to have yourself just as striking. Why use Instagram filters when you can refresh the real thing?
Best of the Maldives: Coconut Spa Treatments – Vakkaru
If you want to not just wear, but infuse yourself with the blossoming fruit of paradise, then Vakkaru’s Signature Journey at Merana Spa will immerse you in the soothing and regenerative oils of the coconut in nearly every manner imaginable…
· “Our signature treatment at the overwater Merana Spa is a 150-minute immersive full-body journey inspired by the finest natural healing and moisturising elements of the coconut. Treatment includes a 15-minute coconut haircare experience, followed by a coconut and sugar body scrub, milk bath with coconut-based nourishments served during your bath and finally, this unique ritual includes a body massage with steamed coconut shell to leave you feeling relaxed, balanced and rejuvenated.”
This cuckoo for coconuts extravagance actually harkens back to the island’s heritage as a coconut plantation with over 1400 coconut trees before it was made into a resort.
Best of the Maldives: Mens Grooming – One & Only Reethi Rah
Holidays are when you often take a break from the hassle of personal grooming. Sometime you even go the whole time neglecting it returning with the ‘holiday beard’. But if you are in the need of a bit of holiday man-scaping, then One & Only Reethi Rah’s “Barber and Blade” spa provides a classic grooming and shaving studio with treatments as soothing as the Maldives ocean breezes…
- “Appointments take place within the private rooms dedicated to gentlemen’s grooming equipped with sleek leather barber chairs, specially designed for One&Only Reethi Rah by Anderson/Miller Ltd. The studio allows guests to feel comfortable and relaxed whilst a dedicated team of grooming experts are on hand to provide a bespoke grooming routine – ensuring that all gentlemen look and feel their best. Barber and Blade exclusively offers Gentlemen’s Tonic products…The treatment menu features basic shaves to beard designs, colouring services and four signature grooming experiences, including the 70-minute Ultimate One&Only Wet Shave.”
The barber shave is a bit of a dying art in with the advent of advanced razors, but they remain one of the few decadent “beauty” treatments men get to enjoy. No matter how many blades you have on your Mach X razor, you will never get as close as a trained professional who is not having to negotiate through a mirror. Furthermore, one of the keys to a close and comfortable shave is the preparation – steaming towel and creamy balm to soften the skin and whiskers. Something few men shaving take enough time to do. And having the hot towel on your face in a chair is as relaxing as it is soothing.
I treated all my groomsmen to a classic shave on my wedding day and we had as much fun (and looked as almost as smart) as the bridesmaids who enjoyed the beauty parlor. And on our recent trip sailing in the Greek isles, we came upon an old school barber offering shaves and it was one of the decadent high points of the holiday sitting in the chair being pampered while listening to the sounds of the bustling port town outside.
Shear luxury.
Best of the Maldives: Intraceuticals – NIYAMA
Many visitors come to the Maldives to feel the fresh clean air on their skin. NIYAMA spa’s new “Intraceutical” treatments now provide that the therapeutic effect of that air…under the skin. The announcement describes…
“Revolutionary for oxygen treatments, Intraceuticals uses a machine that applies oxygen under pressure to deliver a special serum of low molecular weight hyaluronic acid, essential vitamins, antioxidants, and peptides to the skin. The unique technology and specially formulated procedure of an Intraceuticals Treatment leaves skin looking noticeably brighter, firmer and more flawless immediately following the treatment. Depending on individual skin types, treatments can also be focused to address concerns such as wrinkles, hyper-pigmentation or blemishes.”