Hand Held Facial Steamer - for that Fresh Faced Youthful Look

For many years, herbalists and aestheticians have used steam to open the facial pores to allow for deep cleansing and the easy penetration of skin treatments. Today, stream is often applied with a hand held facial steamer, a wonderful weapon to have in your skin care arsenal.

Before the creation of facial steaming appliances, women used to heat water in a pot, throw in a little chamomile to soothe any skin irritations, and then lean over the pot with a towel over their heads. While this method was effective, it was far from comfortable and potentially dangerous! (My towel once caught fire because I accidentally laid it on the eye of the stove!) Thankfully someone had the foresight to invent the hand held facial steamer.

Why a Hand Held Steamer?

The hand held facial steamer is compact for easy storage and portable for travel. While there are full-sized "deluxe" models available, I prefer my portable one. The full-sized facial steamers are infinitely safer than the "stove top method" from the days of old, but most of them still require a certain amount of leaning.

Like many women, I spend a lot of the day hunched over a keyboard so the last thing I want to do is lean over a facial steamer at the end of the day. Yet I still I want my skin to be the ultimate in clean. The portable facial steamer allows me to achieve this by letting me focus the steam on my particular trouble spots - my nose and chin.

The benefits of using steam prior to applying a deep pore cleanser are well known. Open pores make blackhead removal easier and unclogged pores may result in fewer acne problems. But in addition enhancing your cleansing regime, steam is wonderfully hydrating. After using my steamer, my fine lines and wrinkles seem to disappear and my skin seems to glow…and I have yet to destroy a perfectly good towel while using it!