When the opportunity came up to trial the Philips Lumea Precision Plus at-home IPL device I damn near wet myself (and not because I refused to do pelvic floor exercises whilst pregnant - I was EXCITED!!). I foresaw a hair free future. I have long been a fan of IPL hair removal in salons - my armpits are actually just about hair free (I may have exaggerated my hairiness above for humour reasons!). Each one has about 5 stubborn hairs left, so it has been very successful for me. But now that I have The Crazy Kid and Kiki to juggle, finding the time and the baby sitters to allow me to go to a salon is something I have dumped into the 'too hard' basket. This was to be the answer to my hairy prayers
Unfortunately, it just wasn't meant to be for me. The Philips Lumea Precision Plus is not recommended for use when pregnant or breast feeding and, at this point in time, Kiki is still very much attached to her milky friends. When I first heard that it couldn't be used if you were breast feeding I thought 'that's crazy, I don't have hairy boobs so I'd never use it there'. In fact, the hairless status of my boobs is one of the main factors why Kiki prefers them to my husbands (well, that and their delicious milky contents!). But the more I thought about it, the more it made sense. When you are pregnant, your hormones go mental. You become more sensitive to the sun and your skin pigments much more readily. When you are breast feeding, though to a lesser than when you are pregnant, your hormones are still a little mental. Whereas the safety of the machine has been established in normal skin, it has not been tested on the skin of pregnant and breast feeding women. That means that, at this stage, I cannot review it for you but I thought that I'd still do a write up on the machine as it really does sound quite exciting.
How it works: the Lumea Precision Plus uses Intense Pulsed Light (IPL), to prevent hair regrowth. It applies gentle pulses of light to the unwanted hair to produce heat that is transferred to the hair follicle. The follicle is then stimulated into a resting phase and as a consequence, the hair sheds naturally and regrowth is inhibited. European studies have shown over 80 per cent hair reduction can be achieved in as little as four bi-weekly treatments.
Philips Lumea Precision Plus includes five adjustable light settings to ensure gentle but effective treatment across a wide variety of skin tones and hair colours, which is awesome as it means that it will work on much more people than just those with pale skin and dark hair. It also comes with an integrated UV filter and advanced safety controls to provide maximum protection for skin - as the majority of users aren't hair removal technicians this is essential so we don't all end up burning ourselves.
The device comes with tailored attachments - a large attachment for the body meaning that larger areas can be treated at once - in fact both legs can be treated in around 15 minutes. There is also the precision attachment for the face (or bikini line) meaning that only the areas you want to zap will be zapped and that you can finally get rid of your lady moustache!
An enhanced battery life allows a full body and face treatment to be completed in one application without the need to recharge and it features a prolonged lamp lifetime of 100,000 flashes, enabling the device to be used for a minimum of 5 years without the need for a replacement lamp, so you are going to get a good many years use out of this machine.
The new Lumea Precision Plus will be available in Australia from October at Shaver Shop stores nationally with a RRP of $AU1,299.95.
If Kiki is anything like The Crazy Kid then I expect her to wean herself when she is about 9 months (well that's what Crazy did), so hopefully that means that I can review this device sometime in the new year. In the mean time, I will post links to any reviews I find on this device as this is the type of beauty investment that you really want to know works before forking out the money.
Have you tried an at home IPL device before? Is this a product that would interest you?