At a birthday party recently, I was waiting at the bar when a man, probably in his mid-forties, came up and said, “I’ve been watching you, you have the most amazing frame on your face.” I was amazed.
I can’t describe how completely random this was. My answer was: Are you serious? No one has ever told me that. Then a woman on the other side, much younger, probably in her early 30s, said, “I’ve been thinking about that, too.”
Maybe it was just elaborate jerks and they planned to lure me into emptying my bank account or joining a weird sex cult (it didn’t, in case you were worried). It’s been a long time since someone complimented me on my face.
I can trace this back to the five sessions of a new aesthetic medical treatment called EMface, which I had between November and early January. I’m told full results won’t start until spring.
Well, the proof of pudding isn’t just in clinical studies and academic papers. It’s in other people’s comments.
Kate Spicer investigates whether the “first machine facelift” really works. Pictured during the operation
My Emface’s journey began months ago when a machine somewhere between a vacuum cleaner and a dishwasher was moved into the treatment room. The clinic’s owner, Dr. Rita Raccos, paid around £200,000 for this piece of cosmetic engineering. I was hoping it would work at this price.
For a client the expenses are around £2,500 for four or five sessions, and £3,000 for six 20-minute sessions. This is Emface, and it’s described as the first facelift. No knife, no needles, no laser, no harsh acids, no pain, but satisfying, noticeable lifting results.
The company’s previous moves into the cosmetics market included EMsculpt, which used technology to build muscle, tone skin and melt fat in specific areas of the body. One session is the equivalent of 20,000 sit-ups or squats, apparently.
Before a facial begins, I have to be plugged in. A cold, sticky pad of conductive material is attached to my back, and a cable runs from my jumper to the plugs in the device.
The pad on my back creates a circuit so that the three other pads placed on my forehead and cheeks can deliver the electricity required to pass radiofrequency (RF) — gentle, intense heat — deep into the dermis, and what’s called high-intensity focused electrical stimulation (HIFES), which looks like spiders. The electric daggers that crawl over my face. It’s not pleasant, but it’s not painful either.
‘What you’ll get is a little bit of a cheekbone lift,’ says Dr. Rakos. This is the largest part of the scaffolding on your face that holds a lot. You will have more collagen, it tightens and rejuvenates the skin while the muscles are strengthened.
Clinical studies conducted by the manufacturer indicate that the treatment increases muscle density by 30 percent, reduces wrinkles by 36.8 percent and lifts by 23 percent.
How do you achieve these results? RF technology heats the dermis to stimulate the production of collagen and elastin fibres, improving the skin’s appearance and texture. Electrical stimulation sends thousands of impulses per session to tighten specific ‘lifter’ muscles under the pads—the frontal, which smooth the forehead and raise the eyebrows, as well as the cheek muscles, which fill out the cheekbone, lift the cheek line, and raise the eyebrows. Jaw line and raised corners of the mouth.
For a client the expenses are around £2,500 for four or five sessions, and £3,000 for six 20-minute sessions. Kate photographed before treatment
The British author praised the EMface treatment, for which she conducted five sessions. Pictured after the transformation
Emface has modest results compared to invasive methods, but honestly, that’s exactly what I want: a subtle improvement.
I didn’t have it until my last session when I was sent to Germany to write about an expensive private doctor they call the king of health. Dr. Koenig fixes the rich and famous (hence Botox and the high modifiers). Many A-listers who I can’t name want to check in with him every year.
As Dr. Koenig was recording my medical history, he reached over to the Aesthetic Medicine section of his questioning and muttered to himself, “Botox, yeah.” Went to check the box in the forms, my expected agreement is just a formality.
‘no. I said: I don’t have Botox. I haven’t had it in years. I frowned so hard to show him how much I liked “11 lines” between my eyebrows, faking a mixture of nervousness, reading in bad light so as not to disturb the angry dove next to me in bed and always forgetting my reading glasses.
Dr. Koenig seemed suspicious and reassured me that it was okay to get the work done and I didn’t need to lie. I insisted I didn’t have anything in my face because that was the truth. He begrudgingly complimented me on my line-free forehead (then said I’d look better with blepharoplasty to remove excess skin on my eyelids).
Emface has modest results compared to invasive methods, and is ideal for those who want a subtle touch. Pictured is Kate in March
So while Emface can’t attack the muscles that make up my 11s, remove excess skin on my eyelids, or crows feet around my eyes, it did give me an amazing result overall, considering it’s a non-invasive pain-free treatment.
It’s the result I’ve been craving since I decided to steer clear of needles (I once had filler to raise the corners of my mouth but ended up with a duck face. My sister-in-law laughed out loud, her sister said, “It’s not so bad, you look like someone from TOWIE.” )
At the end of my fifth and final session with Dr. Rakos, she looks at my face with an expert look and says the machine has done about four injections of fillers and Botox, in terms of improving it on my face.
I mention a few things that still bother me – faded marionette lines next to my mouth and those 11 things. I can live with crows feet. She thinks she can fix it with one injection of Botox.
She describes a similar machine, the Juvena, that uses the same technology but can work on different parts of the face. I decided to say no, for now. Not least because I ran out of budget.
Clinical studies conducted by the manufacturer indicate that the treatment increases muscle density by 30 percent, reduces wrinkles by 36.8 percent and lifts by 23 percent. Kate envisions getting treatment at the clinic
Racus – who has been dubbed “London’s Queen of Lips” for her skills with the syringe – is very convinced that pain-free, needle-free facials are the future. She doesn’t use anything else herself. “I now have machine treatments,” she says.
Awaiting reception, I met another plastic surgeon at the clinic (she prefers not to be named as she also works in the NHS). She, too, says she never uses anything but machines, despite taking gallons of Botox and fillers over the years, like Dr. Rakos.
So how do I choose to measure my results? Well, the before-and-after scale is pretty brutal, if a little underwhelming. Then there were my fans at the party. Or the woman at a funeral who said, “Damn, how your skin is so silky.”
The biggest test for me is always how I feel, not how I look. When I look at myself in the mirror in the morning, or notice myself in the reflection of a shop window, do I (a) startle, or feel mild shock or distress, or (b) feel at best surprised or nothing at all, or (c) delighted and excited So much noticeable improvements that I have to stop and play in every reflective surface?
As a 53-year-old adult, it’s a second choice these days: (b) It’s my favorite, and that’s exactly what I got.
Kate Spicer received her treatments at Dr Rita Rakus’ clinic in South West London (drritarakus.co.uk). Emface prices start at £2,500.
