Hebrides Harmony
How Terri is bringing harmony to Harris...
Inside the thoroughly modern Hotel Hebrides, formerly the Macleod Motel, in the centre of Tarbert is the utterly modern innovation of a professional beautician, offering massage, facials, waxing, make up and a wide variety of other treatments.
Hebrides Harmony is based there from Wednesday to Saturday every week, providing a unique service to people in the area and also to guests in the hotel. At other times the service is available through Bliss Therapy in the Granite Building on Cromwell Street, Stornoway.
Hebrides Harmony is the brainchild of Terri McGeoghegan, whose family run the Laxdale Holiday Park, and who has had extensive training and experience before launching off on her own.
Terri gained an HND in Beauty Therapy at the Glasgow College of Commerce on a two-year course which included work experience at a salon in the city. She moved back to Stornoway to work for a couple of years with Body and Sole in Keith Street and has since completed additional specialist training courses as well.
Now with Hebrides Harmony she is creating the only in-house beauty service for a hotel in the islands while also providing people in Harris with easy access to a full range of beauty and massage treatments for the first time on a full-time basis.
She started work in Hotel Hebrides for the first time in February and has attracted a wide range of customers, aged from 16 to 60. Customers must book by contacting Terri on her mobile phone and then enter the hotel and go to the first floor where there is a small waiting area outside the fully equipped salon (nominally room 107) which has a view out over the eastern side of the village at the front of the hotel.
The salon is compact and fully equipped to provide massages, ear candle treatment for blocked ears and sinuses, waxing, facials, make-up for weddings, fake tanning, and anti-cellulite treatments. Terri uses the top German company Babor to provide the products associated with her facials and massages.
Despite being described as a Beauty Salon, Hebrides Harmony is open to men as well, with the massage and ear-candle treatments being particularly appropriate. While the various massages are not a substitute for full-scale physiotherapy, they are good for reducing back-pain, alleviating the impact of sports injuries, dealing with knotted muscles, reducing the impact of stress and generally soothing aches and pains in the joints and muscles. Terri generally provides a more masculine atmosphere, with different music and a more business-like ambience for any male customers.
Terri points out there is no need to suffer in silence from the impact of work or sport and she promises to leave any man’s bushy eyebrows to sprout in any direction they want – unless asked to deal with them, of course! She is aware that most men would be very nervous about trying to undergo a massage, plus both men and women may be ticklish and find it difficult to start with. However, she has found that after 10 or 15 minutes, the nervousness fades and the massage begins to work.
Having got the salon established, Terri is now looking forward to helping local people cope with the pressures and demands of the summer season, whether related to attending weddings, going on holiday or simply looking and feeling good for themselves and their guests. In addition, visitors will find a service that has never before been available and one that costs dramatically less than other hotel based beauticians around the world. Contact
Beauty Therapy at Hotel Hebrides (Harris) and Bliss Therapy (Lewis)
Tel: 07746 126986 Email: info@hebridesharmony.co.uk
