Spirited Away

Spirit & Soul Spa breathes life into weary feet

Story and photos by Elizabeth Piseczny

After hiding in sneakers, rain boots, and cute waterproof flats for months, most feet are craving TLC and some fresh polish before making their debut in flip-flops for the summer. The staff at Spirit & Soul Spa demonstrate their understanding that even if you schedule an appointment thirty minutes beforehand, or just walk in, a pedicure isn’t a wham-bam procedure. It should prepare feet for the beach and put you in a summer breeze kind of mood. At Spirit & Soul, a pedicure is an experience not just for the feet, but for the psyche.

Snuggled in among the shops across from the Plattsburgh Public Library, Spirit & Soul Spa is a blink-and-miss-it store front located at 22 Oak Street. At midday, the street is bustling with people running to and from their lunch breaks, but once you step inside the little shop, the mood changes entirely. Gone are the city smells of car exhaust, replaced by the clean, fresh scent of body lotions and sugar scrubs. Walls are painted muted, earthy pastels almost certainly named “sage” or “dusky rose,” and the décor is girly and elegant without being over the top. 

The staff is friendly, greeting customers promptly without ruining the relaxing atmosphere by getting in their faces.  Sunlight streams through the windows onto the simple wooden floor in the main room, from which you walk into a side room, clean and nail polish-fume-free, where a massage chair waits, calling for you to recline and set the massage chair to “knead” on repeat. Further back, behind a partition, are clean sinks for hair washing. A dimly lit room on the left seductively offers a massage table and a shower for rinsing off after a full body scrub.

Inside the pedicure room, clients are invited to browse the OPI brand nail polishes, which gleam like gems in colors ranging from ruby red to bubble gum pink to witty “I don’t know, ‘Beets’ me!” A magazine rack, overflowing with glossy covers spouting celebrity gossip, is conveniently positioned between the two pedicure chairs. From the second you step into the bubbling whirlpool tub to soak your feet, you’ll forget the months of  doubling up on wool socks you’ve endured while waiting until May for the North Country to thaw. 

Before getting started with any services, clients are asked to fill out a simple form notifying staff of any special circumstance, illnesses, or allergies they should be aware of. This policy seems to keep in line with the standards Spirit & Soul holds itself to, as the pedicure room also holds an autoclave, which reassures customers that any tools that are reused are sanitized. Also, Spirit & Soul offers customers the luxury of having their own tools, which they can bring home with them or have held at the salon for their next visit. The spa also tempts customers to completely indulge with a wide range of services like facials, body scrubs and massages.

As is standard with a spa pedicure, the pedicurists at Soul and Spa will soak and soften your feet, but not without making sure the temperature of the water is perfect, and offering you coffee, tea or a glass of water. As soon as you’re comfortable, the chatty pedicurist will keep you engaged in conversation, so if you’re looking for a tranquil treat, a pedicure probably isn’t the way to go.

Before trimming, filing and buffing your feet to perfection, the pedicurist will ask you take a sniff and make a choice between the two homemade sugar foot scrubs the salon offers with the spa pedicure. The chocolate scrub will certainly appeal to any chocoholic out there. Scouring your soles, the scrub leaves skin silky even before the pedicurist slathers and massages your feet — without tickling — with a rich, thick lotion that penetrates and softens any callus. However, a warning to the wise: skip the scrub if your feet are cut or blistered. Don’t find out about the stinging burn of raw sugar and olive oil the hard way if your pedicurist doesn’t notice an open cut.

Even though the soaking and scrubbing may have effects that last for up to two weeks,the final step of a pedicure at Spirit & Soul may be the most instantly gratifying. After the application of a clear coat, two coats of color and a top coat, your feet will look and feel like heaven.

Now don’t get the wrong idea, the place isn’t paradise. Targeted to the (miniscule) demographic of young women who have almost fifty dollars to drop on a pedicure that will last two weeks at most, the shop that calls itself "Pure Heaven from Sole to Soul" occasionally reveals itself as just a sleepy college town salon when the static-y local Top Forty station playing from a back room drifts in. And if you find yourself dozing off while having your feet rubbed with a thick cocoa scented lotion, be wary — the phone will probably ring loudly at the front desk, jerking you back from the beaches of Hawaii to the reality of Spirit & Soul.

All in all, Spirit & Soul Spa is more than just a nail salon and definitely offers a more personal and satisfying experience than a trip to the salon in the mall ever could, as long as you‘re willing to pay a little (or a lot) extra. A small business, Spirit & Soul lacks the ability to get crowded, thus making it a great escape for someone who needs a mini- vacation during the week. Even though it doesn’t offer the same kind of tranquility as a week’s stay at a five-star spa resort, APN was impressed with the concern the staff had for the customer’s comfort.

How do you indulge?

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