The fastest way to clear brown spots and redness.
Lumecca is intense pulsed light — broadband light rather than a single-wavelength laser — and it is the best tool we own for two specific things: the brown spots a Colorado summer leaves behind, and the reds that come with rosacea, flushing and broken capillaries. It is used in Fitzpatrick skin types I through IV, and we’ll tell you before you book if that isn’t you.
What it is
Intense pulsed light — broadband, not a laser
Best for
Brown spots, freckling, redness, broken capillaries
Skin types
Fitzpatrick I–IV only
Series
Three for face and neck · six for body
Session
About 15–30 minutes
Downtime
Spots darken, then flake over 5–10 days
Best season
Fall through spring, away from sun exposure
From
$350 a session · $950 for three
The short version
- What does Lumecca actually treat?
- Reds and browns. Sun spots, freckling and uneven pigment on one side; diffuse flushing, broken capillaries and the redness of rosacea on the other. It clears both in the same pass, which is what makes it efficient over larger areas like the chest and hands.
- How many treatments will I need?
- Face and neck are planned as a series of three. Body areas — chest, arms, legs — are a series of six, because the skin there responds more slowly and holds more accumulated damage. Sessions are spaced roughly four weeks apart.
- Can I have it if I have darker skin?
- Not with IPL. Lumecca is used in Fitzpatrick types I through IV. In types V and VI the light can’t reliably distinguish a brown spot from brown skin, and the risk of burns and post-inflammatory hyperpigmentation is too high to accept. We use the Aerolase Neo instead, which treats pigment and redness across all six skin types.
- Is there downtime?
- Not in the sense of staying home. You’ll be flushed and warm for a few hours, and treated brown spots darken to look like coffee grounds before flaking away over about five to ten days. Most people wear makeup the next day and carry on; it’s just visible while it happens.
- When should I book it?
- Fall through early spring. IPL and sun exposure work against each other — you need to arrive without a tan and stay out of the sun afterwards, which is difficult to promise in a Denver July. Treating the damage over the winter and protecting it through the summer is the pattern that holds.
Broadband light, and why that matters.
A laser emits one wavelength. IPL emits a broad range of them — roughly 515 to 1200 nanometers — filtered down to the band that suits the target. That’s the whole difference, and it cuts both ways.
The upside: a single pass can treat two entirely different targets. Hemoglobin in dilated vessels absorbs the light and the vessel collapses. Melanin in a sun spot absorbs it, heats, and the pigment breaks up and rises to the surface, where it darkens for a few days and then sheds. Reds and browns, same session.
The downside: broadband light needs contrast between the target and the skin around it. When the surrounding skin holds a lot of melanin — whether that’s a deeper skin type or a fresh tan — the light can’t tell the difference, and the energy meant for the spot lands on everything. That is the entire reason for the skin-type limit, and the reason we will reschedule you if you arrive tanned.
Denver makes this treatment more useful than it would be at sea level. Ultraviolet exposure climbs with elevation, and at 5,280 feet with the sun out most of the year, photodamage accumulates faster than people expect. It usually shows on the chest and the backs of the hands before the face — those are the areas nobody remembers to protect.
- Device
- Lumecca, by InMode — the intense pulsed light platform
- Wavelengths
- Filtered broadband light, approximately 515–1200 nm
- Targets
- Hemoglobin in vessels, melanin in pigmented lesions
- Skin types
- Fitzpatrick I–IV. For V and VI we use the Aerolase Neo instead
- Session length
- Roughly 15 minutes for a face; longer for arms or legs
- Comfort
- A brief hot snap with each pulse. No numbing for most areas
Two categories, handled well.
Everything below responds to light that targets either pigment or blood vessels. If your concern isn’t on this list, IPL probably isn’t the tool — and the section further down says so plainly.
Sun spots and solar lentigines
The flat brown spots that collect on the face, chest, shoulders and hands after years of Colorado sun. These respond the most dramatically and often clear substantially within the first two sessions.
Freckling and uneven tone
Scattered freckling that has darkened with sun exposure, and the general mottling of photodamage. Results vary with how deep the pigment sits.
Diffuse redness and flushing
Background redness across the cheeks and nose, including the vascular component of rosacea. Usually planned alongside a longer-term rosacea protocol rather than as a standalone fix.
Broken capillaries
Visible telangiectasia around the nose and cheeks. These often respond quickly — individual vessels can disappear within a session or two.
Poikiloderma of Civatte
The red-brown mottling on the sides of the neck and upper chest that comes from decades of sun exposure. Treated as a series of six, and one of the most satisfying areas to correct.
General photodamage
The overall dullness, blotchiness and coarse tone of sun-damaged skin. Improvement here is gradual and cumulative rather than dramatic in one visit.
If IPL isn’t right for your skin, we own two lasers that are.
Lumecca is used in Fitzpatrick skin types I through IV. In types V and VI, IPL cannot reliably distinguish a brown spot from brown skin — the risk of burns and post-inflammatory hyperpigmentation is real, and no result is worth it. Any practice offering you IPL on deeply pigmented skin without that conversation is one to walk away from.
This is exactly why we bought the Aerolase pair. The Neo Elite treats pigment, redness and acne across all six Fitzpatrick types, and the Era Elite handles texture and scarring. Nobody who walks in here gets told we can’t help — they get told which device.
We assess your skin type at the consult, before anything is booked. That assessment also covers pigment history, medications that increase light sensitivity, and whether you tan readily, all of which change the plan.
Three for the face, six for the body.
Facial skin turns over faster and holds less accumulated damage than the chest, arms and legs. The series lengths reflect that, and they aren’t negotiable down — stopping halfway through a body series usually means uneven clearing.
Consult and skin typing
We assess your Fitzpatrick type, look at what the pigment actually is, and take a history — sun exposure, medications, whether you tan, previous treatments. If the brown you want gone turns out to be melasma, the plan changes completely, and we would rather find that out now than after a session that makes it worse.
Prep, and the two weeks before
No sun exposure, tanning beds or self-tanner for two to four weeks. Retinoids and exfoliating acids pause for several days. Arriving with a tan means we reschedule — we would rather move the appointment than treat skin that has changed since we assessed it.
The session
Eye shields on, cool gel applied, then a series of bright pulses across the area. It feels like a quick hot snap each time, more noticeable over bony areas and directly on spots. A face takes about fifteen minutes; arms or legs take longer.
The series
Face and neck: three sessions, roughly four weeks apart. Chest, arms and legs: six sessions on the same spacing. You will see change after the first, and the series is what makes it even.
Holding it
IPL clears existing damage; it doesn’t stop new damage arriving. Daily broad-spectrum sunscreen is the entire maintenance plan, plus a session or two most years — usually in the fall, after the summer has done its work.
Lumecca IPL pricing
Single sessions and series pricing, current as of 2026. Face and neck are planned as a series of three; body areas as a series of six.
Face & Neck — series of three
Body — series of six
Body skin holds more accumulated damage and clears more slowly, so these are planned as six.
Members receive 12% off individually priced treatments; series pricing is already discounted and isn’t stacked. See memberships for what’s included. Prices are current as of 2026 and confirmed in writing at your consult before anything is scheduled.
What the week after looks like
Two to four weeks of no sun
No tanning, no self-tanner, no sunburn. Pause retinoids and acids a few days out. Come with clean skin and no makeup on the treatment area.
Fifteen to thirty minutes
Eye shields, cool gel, and a series of bright flashes with a hot snap to each one. Most people describe it as brief and very tolerable, though bony areas and dense spots sting more.
Warm and flushed
The area looks like mild sunburn and feels warm for a few hours. Cool compresses help. Some treated vessels look darker or more visible before they fade.
Coffee grounds, then gone
Treated brown spots darken sharply — this is the part people aren’t warned about elsewhere — and then flake away on their own. Don’t pick or scrub them. Makeup over the top is fine from the next day.
Sunscreen, without exception
Broad-spectrum SPF daily on every treated area, and genuine sun avoidance. Skin that has just been treated pigments more readily, and one long afternoon outside can undo a session.
Even, then maintained
Each session clears more. By the end of the series the tone reads even rather than patchy. Results vary with how much damage was there and how consistently it’s protected after.
What Lumecca won’t do
IPL is the right answer for a narrow set of concerns and the wrong answer for several others. Being clear about the second list is how you avoid paying for a series that was never going to work.
It won’t fix melasma — and it can make it worse. Melasma is driven by heat and hormones as well as light, and IPL delivers heat. It may look better briefly and then return darker. If the brown on your face is melasma, that protocol is a different page and a different plan.
It won’t treat texture. Scarring, large pores, rough skin and etched lines are structural problems. Light that targets color does nothing for them — that’s resurfacing, and it’s the Era Elite.
It won’t tighten anything. IPL does not meaningfully treat laxity or deep wrinkles. If skin is loose, no photofacial series is going to change that.
It isn’t used on Fitzpatrick V or VI. Not a preference — a safety limit. The Aerolase Neo is what we use instead, and it treats the same pigment and redness across every skin type.
It can’t be done on tanned skin. A recent tan, including from a self-tanner, changes the contrast the device depends on. We will reschedule rather than treat, every time.
It doesn’t stop new sun damage. Clearing what’s there is one thing; living at altitude without daily sunscreen will simply rebuild it. The treatment is half a plan without the protection.
Lumecca IPL, answered
At Skin!, a single face treatment is $350 and a series of three is $950. Face and neck is $450 a session or $1,200 for three. Body areas are planned as six: chest $2,400, arms $3,800, legs $3,800. Members receive 12% off individually priced treatments. You’ll have written pricing at the consult before anything is booked.
Three for face or face and neck, six for the chest, arms or legs, spaced about four weeks apart. Some people see most of what they wanted after two sessions on the face; the rest of the series is what makes the result even rather than patchy.
Each pulse feels like a brief hot snap. Most people find a face very manageable without numbing, though spots and bony areas sting more sharply. Sessions are short enough that it stays in the range of uncomfortable rather than painful.
No. IPL is used in Fitzpatrick types I through IV. In types V and VI it can’t reliably distinguish pigment in a lesion from pigment in the surrounding skin, which risks burns and post-inflammatory hyperpigmentation. We use the Aerolase Neo for those skin types, which treats pigment, redness and acne across the full range.
We don’t use it for melasma. Melasma responds to heat as well as light and often rebounds darker after IPL, which makes it one of the few conditions where a treatment can leave you worse off than before. Melasma is managed with a different protocol entirely — suppression rather than clearance.
IPL is broadband light, works fast over large areas, and needs contrast between the target and the skin, so it is limited to lighter skin types. The Neo is a single-wavelength 1064 nm laser with a very short pulse, works across all skin types, and treats acne and inflammation as well as pigment and redness. For a fair-skinned patient with sun damage on the chest, IPL is usually faster.
Fall through early spring. You need to arrive without a tan and stay out of the sun during the series, which is realistic in November and not in July. Treating over the winter and protecting through the summer is the cycle that works at this altitude.
Sun exposure, tanning beds and self-tanner for two to four weeks. Retinoids and exfoliating acids for several days. Tell us about any medication that increases light sensitivity, and about recent cold sores if we’re treating around the mouth.
That’s the treatment working. The pigment breaks up, rises toward the surface and darkens — often described as coffee grounds — before flaking away over about five to ten days. Leave them alone rather than exfoliating them off.
Yes, and it’s common. IPL sits well alongside microneedling, peels and injectables as part of a broader plan, though not always on the same day. What we won’t do is stack heat-based treatments in a way that raises the pigmentation risk — the order matters more than the list.
The ones treated are cleared. New ones form with new sun exposure, which at 5,280 feet is a genuine consideration. Most people hold their result with daily sunscreen and a session or two a year, typically in the fall.
At Skin! Medical Aesthetics, 3405 N Downing St, Suite B, Denver, CO 80205 — in RiNo, between Five Points and City Park. Book a consult online or call 720-902-9597 and we’ll tell you honestly whether IPL is the right device for your skin.
Bring us the chest you’ve stopped photographing.
Sun damage at altitude accumulates quietly for years and then becomes the thing you notice in every picture. It’s one of the most fixable concerns we treat.