A CITY clinic dedicated to improving wellbeing through aesthetic treatments is finally back on a “stable footing” after months of uncertainty as a result of the Covid-19 lockdown.

VL Aesthetics, on Kingmoor Road in Carlisle, provides a range of beauty and skincare treatments to men and women.

As with clinics across the country, VL Aesthetics faced a long period of uncertainty as the lockdown began to be first relaxed.

Government guidelines prevented treatments on the face from going ahead until August 15. This prevented VL Aesthetics from being able to offer the majority of its treatments until just over a month ago.

Now fully reopened, VL Aesthetics has almost returned to business as usual.

The clinic has put in place a number of special arrangement to ensure any potential risk of Covid-19 transmission is minimised.

Appointments are being staggered in order to ensure effective social distancing.

Managing director Vanessa Brown said that it took time to get back up and running after being closed for so long.

“Obviously we’re doing things differently now,” she said.

“Everything is back to normal in terms of the treatments we can offer, but security and safety is our number one priority.

“We’re a clinic so we have PPE anyway, and our staff are on reduced hours so that we can stagger appointments and maintain social distancing.”

She said that while many of their customers were returning, there were “quite a few” who were not currently in a position to do so as a result of their jobs being at risk.

“There are some people that are maybe a bit nervous about returning,” Vanessa added.

However, she stressed that those who had returned expressed how safe they had felt upon returning.

Despite the challenges brought by lockdown, Vanessa and the rest of the team at VL Aesthetics were excited to expand the business, welcoming nutritionist and movement coach Bhavin Prajapati on board over the summer.

Bhavin’s movement and weight management programmes had already proved popular with clients.

“As a business, we’re always looking to adapt and innovate, so that’s something we’re looking at doing more of,” Vanessa said.

Vanessa hopes to be able to continue innovating.

“We have a lot planned in the coming months, bringing in new people and new treatments. Hopefully we can announce those soon.”