New beauty treatment puts snail slime to work in rolling back the years

Staring Monday, women who want to slough off dead skin, clear their pores or roll back the years can submit themselves to five minutes of mollusks.

"Slime from snails helps remove old cells, heal the skin after sunburn and moisturize it," said Manami Takamura, a spokeswoman for the Tokyo-based beauty salon Ci:z.Labo, while placing three of the gastropods on a woman's face.

"In this way, you can have 100 percent pure snail essence directly on the skin," she said.

Snail slime is believed to have an anti-aging effect on human skin, and some cosmetics are already sold with essence of escargot.

But Ci:z.Labo beauty salon is going one step further in what it says is the first live snail treatment in Japan.

As part of the salon's Celebrity Escargot Course, customers will get five minutes of snail therapy, along with a massage and other types of facial treatment.

The snails alone cost ¥10,500. Sayaka Ito said she found the treatment so relaxing that she had almost fell asleep.

"You can feel the snails moving on your face. At first, it is surprising, but it's actually rather nice," she said.

"My skin really does feel smooth and moist."

Source: JapanTimes