A Facial Trainer Explains How to Sculpt Your Face at Home

If you haven’t heard of noninvasive facial workout studio FaceGym, here’s your PSA: it’s a must-visit for de-puffing, sculpting and toning your face. The facial workout, which is performed by a FaceGym trainer, uses knuckling and lifting movements along with new and noteworthy technologies to “lift” the skin. It’s so effective, it can temporarily tighten up to 40 different muscles in the face. My trainer told me that he sees customers returning anywhere from once a week to once a month, but he also taught me a few ways I can get Gym-level results without leaving my apartment.

When I visited the studio, I got the FaceGym Clean + Lift Workout ($175), which includes its signature sculpt workout with a cleansing and detoxing IV infusion at the end. Here’s how it went:

At the beginning of the treatment, my trainer shared his most important piece of advice with me: “You want to alternate your stronger, acid-based cleaners with a gentle cleanser a couple times per week. FaceGym treatments all start with a cleanser, and if your cleanser is not pH balanced and it’s too aggressive, everything else you’re going to do is going to be half as effective.” The cleanser he used on my skin was the FaceGym Electro-Lite Gel Cleanser ($38), which replenishes the skin barrier to reveal a brighter complexion.

“When de-puffing your face from home, you want to make sure you’re increasing your circulation. Your cleansing process is the first thing that does,” he continues, while massaging the cleanser into my face with his knuckles in upwards motions. “This motion is de-puffing, but it also enhances the effectiveness of the cleanser because this is a good spreading motion—it’s going to add some friction to the cleanser, so it absorbs a little better. Just rubbing the cleanser on isn’t going to do much, you have to really get in there!”

Next up, he reduced tension in my face using the FaceGym Face Ball ($30), a muscle-massaging, circulation-boosting product I ended up bringing home with me. To use this at home, simply place the ball in the middle of the forehead and press it downwards on the muscle before using scooping motions to lift and stretch the area of tension. You can use this on the jaw, cheeks and neck for added relief, too. “Another thing that’s very important for lifting the face at home is using tools. So, the Facial Yoga Ball works with the lymphatic system to give you a little drainage, but also relaxes your facial muscles. It’s so easy to do at home.”

Other tools he used on me throughout the treatment were the FaceGym Multi-Sculpt High-Performance Contouring Tool ($60), a gua sha tool that features six different edges to lift and contour the face, and the FaceGym Pure Lift Face Facial Toning Device ($520), which taps triple wave technology to workout your facial muscles and lift them up. He was also a master at toning with his hands—an easy-to-master practice for at-home sculpting—using upwards motions to lift the skin and add extra contour to the face.

If you want to follow along with others while you sculpt your face, FaceGym offers instructional, step-by-step videos that provide loads of instruction on its Instagram.