The Rustic Sun Spa

I had a delightful Japanese head spa experience here, very relaxing and the perfect pressure massage. I usually struggle with treatments longer than an hour, but this was ok and the final blow dry and massage made it so worthwhile. I came back for a hair trim and last lift and tint, both of which were fabulous. The delicious complimentary drink was the cherry on top!

Very disappointing experience overall. We took our daughter here to get acrylic nails done while on holiday. The initial price was 450k, which is already on the expensive side, especially as my wife regularly gets her nails done at home for the same price. We later found out that French tips were an additional 200k and colouring was another 150k. It would have been nice to have these extra costs explained upfront before starting the service, but we accepted the final price and moved on. The biggest disappointment, however, was the quality. The appointment took over 3 hours, and given the amount of money we paid and the time involved, we expected a much better result. By the very next day, two of my daughter’s nails had simply fallen off. They hadn’t broken or been damaged; they just came off completely. On top of that, one of my daughters nails was very poorly done. We didn’t complain about the price at the time because we understood that quality work takes time, but unfortunately, the results simply didn’t justify the cost or the 3+ hours spent in the salon. It’s especially disappointing when you’re on holiday and just want to treat your daughter to something nice. We expected better quality, better communication about pricing, and a service that would last longer than a single day. Sadly, we wouldn’t consider this a good experience.

Unfortunately, our experience at this place, where I went for a Japanese head spa with three of my friends, was very disappointing from the beginning. They ask you to arrive 15 minutes before your appointment and warn that if you are more than 5 minutes late, the treatment time will be reduced. However, this rule seems to work only one way. Despite arriving early as requested, we still had to wait another 20 minutes before our treatments even started. That’s 35 minutes of waiting in total. The actual treatment was far below expectations. The hair massage, which is supposed to be part of the experience, lasted maybe 2 minutes. The hand and foot massages were even shorter, approximately 30 seconds each. They washed our hair twice, but instead of a relaxing scalp cleanse, it felt like someone was aggressively scratching my scalp with their fingernails. Twice. At one point, I genuinely felt like half of my hair was going to fall out. My friends had a very similar experience. They also applied a lot of shampoo along the entire length of the hair rather than focusing on the scalp, which is particularly damaging and drying for bleached hair. Things didn’t get much better with the facial part of the treatment. They washed my face with a product that immediately made my skin itchy. I specifically mentioned beforehand that I have dry, sensitive skin, but no moisturising product was applied afterwards. My skin just felt increasingly tight and uncomfortable throughout the treatment. The final skincare step was another disappointment. The products caused a burning sensation, and because I could smell alcohol and strong fragrance, I asked to see what they were using. They showed me a basic Nivea sunscreen that smelled like men’s cologne. :( For a premium-priced service, I would expect much better-quality skincare products, especially when they are being applied directly to clients’ faces. I had to ask my therapist to remove it and thankfully had my own alcohol- and fragrance-free sunscreen in my purse. The hair finishing was equally disappointing. My therapist wanted to apply a hair tonic, so I asked to see the ingredients. Once again, alcohol was the first ingredient. They also didn’t use any proper heat protection before blow-drying my hair, just some Elseve hair oil. I understand that not everyone has the same expectations when it comes to skincare and haircare, but I personally invest in high-quality products and pay close attention to ingredients, especially because my hair is bleached and my skin is sensitive. It was very disappointing to discover that a supposedly premium treatment involved so many basic products containing alcohol and fragrance, alongside such rough handling of the hair and scalp. I’m giving one extra star because they offered me a 30% discount after the experience. However, they were already advertising a 10% discount on all treatments on Instagram, which wasn’t applied to my friends’ bookings. My friends ended up paying the full price. Overall, this was nowhere near the relaxing, luxurious Japanese head spa experience we had expected. I wouldn’t return, and if you care about the health of your scalp, hair and skin, I would personally recommend looking elsewhere.