Amy Abrams, who owns and operates the Manhattan Vintage Show, has been getting regular cosmetic acupuncture facials for five years.
“I’ve been going every four to six weeks,” she said, a routine she sees as part of a “self-care commitment” to looking and feeling her best. Lanshin, a beauty spa in Brooklyn that draws from traditional Chinese medicine practices, is her go-to, but recently, Ms. Abrams, 52, found appointments with her acupuncturist difficult to come by.
“She didn’t have anything for six weeks,” Ms. Abrams said. “I mean, that’s great for her, but wow.”
When it comes to achieving youthful-looking, rejuvenated skin, do all roads eventually lead to needles? It seems so, given the multitude of ways to poke one’s face, from Botox injections and plumping fillers to microneedling facials and even P.R.P. (platelet-rich plasma) and salmon sperm DNA injections, all sought out for the promise of a glowier, more supple visage. Pity the needle-phobic!
Cosmetic acupuncture (a.k.a. facial acupuncture), the injection-free outlier of the bunch, uses needles approximately one-fifth the diameter of typical hypodermic needles and is said to increase circulation, boost collagen production and improve skin tone. Long-favored by wellness moguls like Jessica Alba, Kim Kardashian and Gwyneth Paltrow, it has grown in popularity as more people turn to holistic skin care methods. In an interview in May, Sarita Choudhury, who stars in “And Just Like That …,” said she indulged in weekly sessions with her acupuncturist.
As one of the Western Hemisphere’s more widely known forms of traditional Chinese medicine, acupuncture’s stateside popularity reaches back to the 1970s when an American journalist trailing President Richard M. Nixon’s 1971 delegation to Beijing reported on having received the treatment there.
In the ensuing decades, acupuncture coursed through the channels of medicine from alternative to the mainstream, seemingly effective for all manner of ills and conditions including migraine headaches, digestive issues, infertility, insomnia, as well as general pain management. The Olympic gymnast Simone Biles and the N.B.A. star LeBron James incorporated acupuncture into their injury recovery protocols. The wellness and lifestyle website Goop has referred to the treatment in more than 60 articles. Little wonder that as popular interest has spread, some people would look to acupuncture for facial rejuvenation.
Interest in cosmetic acupuncture also aligns with the nascent “notox” movement, which rejects Botox in favor of natural alternatives promising similar results — especially among Gen Z consumers.
Online, Google searches for “cosmetic acupuncture” have increased by 248 percent in the last two years. As of January, the average number of views for notox-related content on TikTok had increased 223 percent in the last year, according to the trend forecasting agency Trendalytics.
Part of cosmetic acupuncture’s outlier status lies in its holistic nature. Typically, treatments target points on the body, as well as on the face, to address issues like poor sleep and digestion, stress, PMS — culprits that can factor into the skin’s appearance.
“Its greatest benefit is that it’s not just skin deep,” said Stefanie DiLibero of Gotham Wellness in Manhattan. There, clients undergo a full health intake before their multistep treatments, which include full-body acupuncture, microcurrent stimulation and manual lymphatic drainage. Ms. DeLibero said 90 percent of her patients came for cosmetic acupuncture but welcomed the all-in-one perks.
Still, there’s a strong emphasis on “cosmetic,” as many salons build in treatments one would see on an aesthetician’s menu: lymphatic drainage massages, hydrating face masks and red light therapy to stimulate collagen production.
At ORA, a wellness spa with two locations in Manhattan, the founder Kim Ross said that even teens with complexion concerns like acne came in for its acupuncture facial, which also includes body acupuncture, gua sha and LED therapy. Since ORA’s opening in 2021, the facial has become one of the its most popular offerings. Regardless of age or generation, nearly everyone is chasing that elusive “glow,” Ms. Ross said.
Jessi Slavich, a facialist and the founder of Vena Cava Skin Therapy in Portland, Ore., gets monthly cosmetic acupuncture facials to release jaw tension. She’s not interested in Botox or fillers despite aging skin being a concern. “As a holistic aesthetician, it’s never occurred to me,” she said.
“Of course I think about wrinkles,” Ms. Slavich continued. “I think about losing collagen. But I wouldn’t do a cosmetic treatment that didn’t support my overall health.”
Claudia Baettig, an acupuncturist who works at Prosper LA in Los Angeles, is seeing women come in as early as their 20s for facial treatments. “A lot of their peers are already doing Botox and injectables, and they want something preventative,” she said. Or they want to avoid Botox altogether.
“I’m just so scared of getting filler and then regretting it,” said Michelle Desouza, who lives in Brooklyn and is the founder of Same Skin, a culture and wellness community for women. She scheduled her first cosmetic acupuncture session with Ms. DiLibero at Gotham Wellness when she was just entering her 30s. She wanted to look rejuvenated but “not look like everyone else,” she said, referring to the ubiquitous “Instagram face,” the neutered look (sometimes facilitated by face-tuning filters and actual aesthetic treatments) that, often as not, looks A.I. generated.
“I think my generation and younger have a skewed perspective about what aging actually looks like,” said Devon Kelley, a content creator in Brooklyn who frequently posts about beauty and wellness. “Stealth filters and retouching are rampant on social media. Celebrities look increasingly younger, and many aren’t honest about the aesthetic treatments they have.”
Ms. Desouza, now 36, said she was an exception among her friends, many of whom had gone the way of Botox. While someone who has gotten Botox can still receive cosmetic acupuncture, Ms. Baettig noted that it was like buying into “two opposing schools of thought.” Botox prevents muscle contraction, while acupuncture performs the opposite.
“We’re stimulating,” she said. “We want to increase circulation to the muscles.”
Does cosmetic acupuncture actually work? Success can be hard to measure because the objective is often subjective and varying. Ms. Baettig said clients tended to have an instant glow after one session, but she warned them not to expect the same results as one would with injectables.
“But you do see a subtle reduction of fine lines and wrinkles,” she said. “You do see a brighter complexion, typically after anywhere from six to 10 treatments.”
At Prosper LA, where a single cosmetic acupuncture session costs $195 to $225, and at other skin-care salons, including ORA, where the signature facial is $475, a series of treatments could easily put one in the same beauty budget range as injectables. But potential holistic benefits like serenity and a relaxed mood are foreign to most serums, peels and Botox sessions.
“It’s a way for me to center and calm myself,” said Ms. Abrams, whose acupuncturist did manage to see her for a treatment without the six-week wait.
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