It was a surprisingly sunny morning in London when I arrived at the Chelsea office of Wax in the City.
The front desk assistant was especially friendly, helping me with a place to store my many bags since I had just arrived from the airport. Wax in the City has a drop-in style service, so you don’t need to bother with an appointment, and the wait time was short when I arrived.
I had just enough time to catch my breath and have a nice cold, albeit super wanky lemonade at a local café (where I was later informed the real housewives of Chelsea – apparently that’s a thing – meet for brunch or whatever) before I was called in to see my expert ‘Depiladora’ (Wax in the City’s own word for their hair removal experts).
My Depiladora was a very friendly young lady, who made me feel very comfortable before leaving the room so I could undress and lie on the table. I was there to have my back waxed, so I wasn’t expecting it to be too painful. The process used by Wax in the City was different to my previous experience with waxing strips. Here they use a larger patch of hardening wax, which is removed after a few minutes of cooling. This process allows for larger areas to be waxed than cloth strips, and this means less time, and less pain overall. I was informed that they use different waxes for different areas, so if you have a more sensitive region done, you may have another type of wax applied.
During the process we chatted about what she was doing to me, and how long she’s be working there. I got the feeling that I was the only chatty-Cathy because there seemed to be a lot of silence coming from the other booths in the salon. Perhaps we were alone, or maybe women just don’t like to chat while they’re having hair ripped out of their naughty-bits. Who knows.
After only about 30 minutes my back was ready to go and I was brushed off and given a few care tips to look after my newly bare back.
Waxing offers a few benefits over shaving in that the regrowth is much longer coming in, and is also softer than shaving stubble. I did notice a slight amount of itching about 3-4 weeks later as the hair began reappearing on my back, but this soon passed, and was not as irritable as shaving stubble. The other obvious benefits are that the waxed area is hairless for much longer than shaving, and never has the feeling of dry sand when running your hand over the regrowth when it does come in. The pain is minimal, and worth the results.
Wax in the City in London can be found at 370 King’s Road in Chelsea, SW3 5UZ, and is close to transport stops. They are open every day from 10am to 8pm, except Sundays when they are open from 12 – 5pm.
