A detailed breakdown of the nightly face-taping routine Nikol has used for four years as a Botox alternative. She reviews three tape products — Frownies patches, Natsu Beauty face tape, and Japanese face tape from Amazon — explains her application technique, and shares the full anti-ageing toolkit she stacks on top of taping: gua sha, nanocurrent device, and vibrating plate.
Key takeaways
- Face taping has over a century of history: vintage Hollywood actresses taped their faces in the 1950s and 60s, and Frownies patches — the product Nikol started with — have been manufactured for over a hundred years.
- Consistency is the only variable that matters: doing it once a month produces nothing; doing it every night for months produces visible, measurable smoothness — Nikol describes her forehead as "a skating rink" in the morning.
- Japanese face tape offers the most flexibility: a continuous roll lets you cut custom shapes for your specific problem areas, while pre-cut patches lock you into one size.
- Wait 20 minutes after skincare before taping: tape will not adhere to oily or freshly moisturised skin — let serum and cream absorb first.
- Stretch the skin, not the tape: pulling the tape stretches it thin and reduces adhesion — instead, smooth and hold the skin where you want it, then lay the tape flat over it.
- Stack multiple modalities for compounding results: taping alone helps, but combining it with gua sha, nanocurrent, and a vibrating plate accelerates the outcome.
Why did Nikol stop using Botox?
The full story connects a neurofibroma, a modelling career, nine surgical consultations, IVF, and a pandemic-era reckoning with injectables. Nikol had a neurofibroma growing in her orbital socket since she was about 12. It started small — pea-sized — and grew slowly, creating a visible bulge that bothered her in photos. She consulted nine specialists — plastic surgeons, maxillofacial surgeons, an ocular surgeon — and got nine different opinions ranging from "we will cut through your forehead" to "it will just pop out." No one agreed, so she waited.
In 2005, unable to get surgery, she started Botox at age 30 to soften the deep line the neurofibroma was creating. It had just been FDA-approved around 2003–2004 and was presented as routine and risk-free. She continued for over a decade. During IVF, the neurofibroma doubled in size — the pathology later confirmed that liquid progesterone can accelerate neurofibroma growth. In 2018, she finally found a plastic surgeon willing to remove it. The surgery was life-changing.
With the neurofibroma gone, the reason she started Botox no longer existed. She did one more treatment — possibly 2020 or early 2021 — and then stopped entirely. What pushed her away permanently was the growing evidence of Botox injuries, particularly neurological issues, that she saw women sharing on social media. Her position is direct: the medical community treats Botox as if it is a car wash — routine, casual, risk-free — but adverse reactions happen and some are irreversible. She wanted an alternative, not a replacement. That search led her to face taping.
What are the three face tape products Nikol has tested?
| Product | Pieces per pack | Approximate price | Format | Nikol's verdict |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Frownies Facial Patches | 144 | ~$20 | Perforated paper triangles — wet the adhesive side before applying | Good starter product; adhesive weakened after a year of use and patches began tenting overnight |
| Natsu Beauty Face Tape | 110 | Higher per-piece than Frownies | Pre-cut adhesive strips in one uniform size | Did not love — pieces too small, consumed too many for a full forehead, felt overpriced for what you get |
| Japanese Face Tape (Amazon) | Full roll | $16–20 | Continuous roll you cut to any shape and size | Current favourite — maximum flexibility, comfortable overnight, strong adhesion even over moisturised skin after a 20-minute wait |
Nikol started with Frownies in 2022, roughly a year after her last Botox treatment. The product is a set of perforated paper patches that you wet on the adhesive side and press onto the skin. Two sizes are available: small triangles for the forehead and larger patches for the corners of the eyes and mouth. For about a year, they worked well. Then the patches began lifting overnight, forming small tents over the skin instead of lying flat. Whether the adhesive changed or her skin adapted, the result was the same — the patches were no longer making consistent contact.
She moved to Natsu Beauty face tape after seeing it on TikTok. The pre-cut strips come in a uniform size, which was the problem — they were too small to cover the full forehead without using an impractical number of pieces, and the cost per piece felt high. She finished her supply without reordering.
The Japanese face tape she found on Amazon became her permanent solution. It arrives as a continuous roll, so she pre-cuts an entire roll into squares and half-squares and stores them. At night, she grabs what she needs without having to cut anything. The tape is soft, comfortable, and strong enough to stay in place overnight — even on skin that has been moisturised, as long as she waits the 20-minute absorption window.
How does Nikol apply face tape step by step?
- Complete your nighttime skincare routine. Cleanse, apply serum, apply cream. Nikol does not use oil on her forehead — only serum and cream — because oil prevents tape adhesion even after waiting.
- Wait 20 minutes. Use the time to read, do a red-light therapy session, or any other nighttime routine. The products must absorb fully before tape goes on. Skipping this wait guarantees the tape will not stick.
- Pre-cut your tape. If using the Japanese roll, cut a batch of squares and half-squares so everything is ready. Nikol cuts five or six at a time, stacking them, then slicing down the middle for smaller pieces. Make sure the final cut goes all the way through to avoid snagging.
- Peel and position. Pull from the centre of each piece to separate it from the backing. Do not stretch the tape — stretch and smooth the skin instead, holding it taut where you want it, then lay the tape flat.
- Address your specific problem areas. For Nikol, the primary target is a deep line on her forehead left by the neurofibroma. She places tape directly over it, smoothing the skin flat. Then she works outward, taping across the rest of the forehead and along the sides.
- Optional: address jowls and cheeks. Cut a longer strip, push the jaw forward slightly, and apply the strip from below the jawline upward. Nikol does this about twice a week, not nightly, as an experiment with lymphatic support for the lower face.
- Sleep as normal. The tape should not be felt during the night if properly applied. In the morning, peel from one corner, folding the skin gently — it comes off easily and painlessly, nothing like removing a bandage.
What results does face taping actually produce?
Nikol has taped her forehead every night for approximately four years. Her description of the morning result is consistent and specific: "It is like a skating rink. It is like glass." When she skips a night, she can see the difference. Over four years of nightly use, the cumulative effect she reports is visibly smoother forehead skin that she can see both in person and on camera.
Dermatologists and plastic surgeons often dismiss face taping by saying the smoothing effect is temporary — that the tape simply keeps the skin hydrated at the epidermal level and the lines return within hours. Nikol's counter is pragmatic: she has been consistent for four years and she sees a sustained difference, not just a morning-after effect. She does not claim it replaces surgery or that it will work for everyone. She claims it works for her, and she has the visual record to support it.
The critical variable in her experience is consistency. She tapes every night, no breaks, no weekends off. If you do this once a month, she says flatly, it will not work. The results compound over time, and skipping sessions resets the progress.
What is the full anti-ageing stack Nikol uses alongside taping?
Face taping is one layer in a multi-tool approach. Nikol stacks four modalities, each targeting a different mechanism:
| Tool | What it does | Frequency | When in the routine |
|---|---|---|---|
| Japanese face tape | Holds skin smooth overnight, prevents expression-line deepening during sleep | Every night | After skincare, before bed |
| Stainless steel gua sha | Sculpts and shapes the face, moves lymphatic fluid, reduces morning puffiness | Most mornings | After removing tape, with facial oil |
| Ziip Beauty nanocurrent device | Delivers low-level electrical current to stimulate facial muscles and collagen — essentially a facial workout | 3 times per week | Morning, with conductive gel, 5-minute sessions |
| Vibrating plate | Full-body lymphatic support and circulation — Nikol stands on it while using the Ziip device to stack two modalities at once | 3 times per week | Morning, concurrent with nanocurrent |
The gua sha is stainless steel specifically because hands are oily during use and jade or rose quartz tools break when dropped. Nikol designed hers to survive a bathroom-floor impact. She uses it in the morning after removing the face tape, applying oil first so the tool glides. The motion is firm upward strokes along the jawline, cheekbones, and forehead — the same lymphatic drainage direction she demonstrates in her skincare tutorials.
The Ziip Beauty nanocurrent device delivers a gentle electrical current through a conductive gel. It beeps to signal each stroke is complete, then you reposition and go again. The entire face takes about five minutes. Nikol describes it as having "facials on demand" because the companion app walks you through targeted routines — orbital area, cheeks, full face — so you can focus on different zones each session. She emphasises that she was inconsistent with it at first and did not see results until she committed to regular use and stacked it with her other habits.
How do you map your face for taping?
There is no universal taping pattern. Nikol is explicit that she is not a face-taping expert — she is an esthetician who experiments on her own face and reports what she finds. Her mapping process is simple: look at your face and identify what bothers you. Do you have forehead lines? Elevens between the brows? Nasolabial folds? Jowl softening? Each person's tape placement should target their own specific concerns.
Nikol's personal map targets three areas. The primary zone is her forehead, where she covers the full width from one temple to the other, concentrating tape over the deep line that remained after her neurofibroma was removed. The secondary zone is the sides of the forehead near the temples. The tertiary zone — done about twice a week — is the jawline and lower cheek, where she applies longer strips from under the jaw upward. She got the jowl technique from a massage therapist's video that demonstrates specific measurements for where to place the strips to support the masseter area and lower cheek. She links the video in her description for viewers who want the precise placement.
What are the most common mistakes with face taping?
- Applying tape immediately after skincare. Serum and cream need 20 minutes to absorb. Tape applied to damp or oily skin slides off within the first hour of sleep.
- Using oil on the forehead before taping. Oil never fully absorbs the way a serum-and-cream combination does. If you use facial oil, keep it below the areas you plan to tape.
- Stretching the tape instead of the skin. Pulling the tape thin reduces its adhesive surface and weakens its hold. Smooth and hold the skin flat with your fingers, then lay the tape over it without tension.
- Expecting results from occasional use. Once a month, once a week, every other week — none of these produce visible results. Nikol tapes every night and attributes the consistency to the compounding improvement she sees over four years.
- Rounding the corners of each piece. Some tutorials recommend trimming the corners of each tape square so they do not lift. Nikol does not bother — the tape is soft, not sharp, and the corners stay down as long as the skin is properly prepared.
- Buying pre-cut patches that do not fit your face map. Pre-cut options like Natsu Beauty force you into one size. A continuous roll — like the Japanese tape — lets you cut exactly what each area needs.
How does face taping compare to Botox?
They are not equivalent treatments. Botox is a neurotoxin that temporarily paralyses the muscles responsible for expression lines. It works fast, lasts three to four months, and requires a licensed injector. Face taping does not paralyse anything — it mechanically holds the skin smooth overnight so expression lines cannot deepen during sleep. It requires no appointments, no needles, and costs under $20 a month.
Nikol's shift from Botox to taping was not driven by cost or convenience. It was driven by risk. After 15 years of injections, she watched a wave of women sharing Botox injury stories — neurological side effects that did not reverse. Her view is that the medical community presents Botox as routine and risk-free when it is neither, and that dismissing alternatives like face taping because they lack clinical trials is disingenuous when no one is funding clinical trials on a product that costs $16 on Amazon.
She does not tell anyone to stop Botox. She shares what she does, what she has experienced over four years of consistent taping, and lets viewers decide for themselves. Her position is that every woman should be her own healthcare advocate and make informed choices rather than defaulting to injectables because a doctor says it is the only option.
What should you know about doctors dismissing face taping on social media?
Nikol addresses this directly: she has blocked several doctors — mostly male plastic surgeons and dermatologists — from her social feeds because of what she describes as gaslighting. The pattern she objects to is before-and-after content that uses fear to drive women toward injectables, combined with dismissals of non-invasive alternatives as unscientific. Her response is practical: no one has invested in studying face tape because there is no profit in it. The absence of published clinical data does not mean the method does not work — it means no one has paid to study it.
She is careful to position this as her opinion, not medical advice. But her four years of nightly use and the visible results she documents on camera are her evidence. She invites viewers to try it themselves, be consistent, and judge by their own skin — not by what a doctor selling injectables says about a $16 roll of tape.
The bottom line
Face taping is the cheapest thing in Nikol's beauty routine and, by her account, one of the most effective. Four years of nightly use have given her a forehead she describes as glass-smooth every morning. The method requires nothing expensive, nothing injected, and nothing prescribed — just consistency, patience, and 20 minutes of absorption time after your skincare routine. Combined with gua sha, nanocurrent, and a vibrating plate, it forms a full anti-ageing stack that replaces injectables entirely. Whether you start with Frownies or go straight to Japanese face tape from Amazon, the only rule is the same: do it every night. The results compound. The cost stays under $20 a month. And you never have to sit in a chair and wonder whether today's injection is the one that causes a problem you cannot undo.
Frequently asked questions
Does face tape hurt when you remove it in the morning?
No. The tape peels off painlessly — nothing like removing a bandage or medical tape. Nikol lifts one corner, folds the skin gently, and pulls. There is no redness, no irritation, and no adhesive residue. If a tape product does cause discomfort on removal, switch to a gentler adhesive.
Can I use face tape if I have sensitive skin?
Most face tapes are hypoallergenic, but test a small patch on your jawline or behind your ear for one night before committing to full-face application. If there is no redness or irritation in the morning, you are fine. Nikol uses tape over a serum-and-cream barrier, not directly on bare skin, which adds a protective layer.
How long does one roll of Japanese face tape last?
A $16–20 roll from Amazon contains enough tape for approximately three to four weeks of nightly full-forehead use, depending on how many additional areas you cover. Pre-cutting the entire roll at once saves time and makes nightly application faster.
Can face tape replace a facelift?
No. Face tape addresses surface-level expression lines and provides overnight skin smoothing. It does not tighten deeper facial structures, reposition fat pads, or remove excess skin the way surgical intervention does. Nikol positions taping as a preventive and maintenance tool — something that slows the process — not a replacement for surgery if you have advanced sagging that bothers you.
Why does Nikol use a stainless steel gua sha instead of jade or rose quartz?
Because she drops it. Your hands are covered in facial oil during use, and a stone tool that slips off the counter shatters on a tile floor. The stainless steel gua sha on her website was designed to survive the drop. It also stays cool to the touch, which helps with morning depuffing.
What is nanocurrent, and is it the same as microcurrent?
Nanocurrent is a lower-intensity version of microcurrent. Both deliver electrical stimulation to facial muscles, but nanocurrent operates at a gentler level — you may not feel anything during the session. Nikol uses a Ziip Beauty device, which has a companion app with guided facial routines. She does five-minute sessions about three times a week, often while standing on her vibrating plate to stack two modalities at once.
Do I need to use all four tools in Nikol's stack to see results?
No. Start with face tape alone — it is the cheapest and simplest entry point. Once you have built the nightly habit and can see results, consider adding gua sha, which costs less than most of the other tools and requires no electricity or subscription. Nanocurrent and a vibrating plate are additional layers that accelerate the outcome but are not required.
What if the tape does not stick?
The two most common reasons are applying tape too soon after skincare (the skin is still damp or oily) and using oil on the areas you plan to tape. Wait 20 minutes after serum and cream. If you use facial oil, apply it only below the tape line — forehead, temples, and any other taped areas should get serum and cream only.
How does face taping work for jowls specifically?
Nikol's jowl technique involves cutting a longer strip from the Japanese face tape, pushing the jaw slightly forward, and applying the strip from below the jawline upward along the lower cheek. She does this about twice a week, not nightly. A massage therapist's video she references provides precise measurements for placement targeting the masseter area. The goal is to support the skin in a lifted position overnight and encourage lymphatic drainage in the lower face.
Is four years of face taping enough evidence that it works?
It is enough evidence for Nikol, and she is transparent about that framing. She is not presenting a clinical study — she is presenting her own consistent, documented experience. Her forehead visibly improved on camera over those four years, and she can see the difference on mornings after she skips a night. She invites every viewer to try it for themselves, be consistent, and judge by their own results rather than by any external authority's opinion.
