SKIN SCHOOL: April 2016

My updated spot routine & a mini review

Saturday, April 30, 2016

Be it a special occasion, or you have something important coming up, there's always an uninvited guest that decides to attend too - an annoying spot!
So in my spots post a while ago, I talked about some different causes and types of spots. A lot of what I talk about in that post is pretty basic knowledge to anyone trained within the beauty & skincare industry.
What you basically need to know is: don't squeeze or pick a spot unless it has a noticeable 'white' head, this means your skin is offering the gunk up to you. If it is red, sore and has no head, leave it alone!

My latest spot fighting routine:
(links to products included)

1. First cleanse - to remove make up - using a cleansing oil (one of the following: Una Brennan vitamin C+ brightening cleansing oil (currently half price!), or Body Shop's Chamomile one, Elemis also have brought out a new one called Nourishing Omega Rich cleansing oil which is lovely, too.)

2. Second cleanse, to clean my skin - using a cleansing balm, like the Elemis pro collagen balm, or Emma Hardie's moringa one, or Body Shop's cleansing butter. Read my recommended cleansers post here for more.
3. Bravura's salicylic acid treatment, applied all over my skin and left on for a couple of minutes, concentrating on the spot. See full review here.
4. After removing the salicylic acid treatment, I'll tone using my Darphin Intral toner - this is great for calming any outbreaks of redness, it's amazing generally on any inflammation at all.
5. I'll then apply some of my Clarins Lotus face treatment oil, about 4 drops and press it into my skin (see my serums and oils post here) and massage my face using my Body Shop Twin Ball revitalising facial massager - it helps boost circulation and is great for any lumps and bumps around the jawline. Very draining too, think of it as removing all the '~~crap~~' from your face. See full review of this here.
6. When I've finished massaging my face, I apply the Elemis herbal lavender repair mask over the top and leave it on for about 10 minutes. I mentioned this in my PM routine post here.
7. Remove the mask, tone again using Darphin Intral.
8. I then apply some of the Aesop Control Gel directly on the spot, this product contains salicylic acid which is amazing on spots, as well as aloe vera which calms, hydrates and gets rid of redness. I love the consistency of this, it's quite a thick gel which stays in the area you apply it to. It annoys me when you apply a spot treatment and it's runny, it ends up spreading all over the place where you don't need it.
9. I press in a couple of drops of the Clarins Lotus oil again, and finish by applying some of the Aesop gel onto the spot again, and leave overnight.

This routine is foolproof for me, normally the spot will be gone by the morning, or within a day or so. To some, this routine might seem a bit long winded - but if you want to get rid of that spot, put the effort in.

A Mini Review:

If you follow me on Instagram you may have seen a while ago I've been testing out the Origins Super Spot Remover for a few weeks before reviewing it on here. With skincare you don't always see instant results so it's important to give things a while to see if they work for you.

This is one of those products that seems to have a bit of a cult following. I decided to try this out when my tube of Aesop gel ran out. It's £15.00 for 10ml, (pretty close to the Aesop one which is £15 for 9ml) and the bottle is so small and cute, I didn't realise how small it would be until it arrived in the post and it's tiny!

What initially drew me to this was the fact that it contains salicylic acid, which is one of the best things to use on spots and breakouts. Any regular readers will know, I'm a big fan of acids, they literally changed my skin (along with using good cleansers, etc).

It also contains red algae which is supposed to be very calming and help with redness.

When I first applied this, the first thing I noticed was the smell, it's a strong medicinal smell. It's not unpleasant, but it's quite noticeable.

The consistency is quite a runny gel, when I have it on my finger I feel like I'm rushing to screw the lid back on the bottle, before it runs off my finger and onto the floor! I'd prefer if this was a slightly thicker consistency, as I find it almost spreads too far rather than staying on the offending spot.

As for the results, to be honest, I found it a bit 'meh'....as in, it was okay, nothing mind blowing. It didn't clear up my spots anywhere near as quickly as the Aesop one, and it didn't seem to calm the redness down either.

When it's applied it felt drying and made my skin feel taut, I hate that feeling. I think the drying effect is due to the fact it contains alcohol denat, which is stripping on the skin leaving it feeling 'tight'. I also noticed that when I slept in it, my face got literally stuck to my pillow which hasn't happened before, ew.

All in all, this isn't a product I would repurchase or recommend. I'll stick with my trusty Aesop control gel!

What are some of your best spot fighting products? I'd love to know!

Random spot triggers

Saturday, April 16, 2016

There's many things that can cause you to break out, and it's not always due to your hormones, diet, or using the wrong products.
I wanted to share some other things you can do to help if you suffer with recurring spots, and if you always tend to get them in the same area.

1. Your make up brushes

This is one of the most important things that nearly everyone doesn't do. If you wear make-up, it's important to keep your tools clean, not only for your complexion, but also so your brushes last you for years. Your brushes feel soo much softer afterwards, and your make-up applies much more smoothly. If you use a mineral powder type of foundation that you buff into the skin to apply, keeping your brush clean will help keep the bristles soft and prevent irritation and redness.
You can get 'spot' cleaners, which are usually in a spray form, that you spray onto the bristles and wipe on a tissue, they are good for a quick fix.
Then there's also the deeper clean, where you actually shampoo and wash them. I prefer to do this than a spot clean. I use baby shampoo, create a lather and swirl the bristles around, and rinse until the water runs clear, and leave them to dry flat on a towel. I usually do this every couple of weeks.
Why would you want to spread bacteria all over your face, every day? It's like a vicious cycle, you spread bacteria on your skin, come out in spots, and try to cover them by applying more make-up over the area, putting more bacteria onto your face! Seriously, clean those brushes, your skin will thank you for it.

2. Your bedding
Your bed is a place of tranquillity that we all love, but do you know what's actually in your bed? Studies have shown that beds harbour dust mites (their droppings can cause eczema, asthma and allergies) oils, sweat, food crumbs and bodily fluids.

All of this can make you break out, if you are constantly sleeping in all the dirt and bacteria. So wash your sheets regularly, once a week is best, and make sure the temperature of the wash is at 60°C to kill bacteria and dust mites.

3. Your phone
It seems common for us to 'squat' in public toilets, and to not want to touch the flusher handles, in fear of the germs they harbour (ok, just me?)... but we don't think twice about constantly using our phones all day with filthy hands, and pressing it against our skin when we talk on the phone. Our phones are hotspots for germs, they are warm which helps any bacteria to breed. According to recent studies, your phone is 10 times dirtier than the average toilet seat, but we wouldn't sit and press that against our faces would we? There has also been faecal matter found on 1 in 6 phones.

Just take an anti bacterial wipe and give your phone a quick once over every so often, this especially applies to shared phones (in work environments for example). It's very easy to sit at a computer typing and to touch your face every so often, so try to sanitise any shared computer keyboards, too.

4. Touching your face
It's very common for us to constantly touch our faces, leaning on our hands, picking at spots, etc. Our hands can also harbour lots of bacteria, so try to wash your hands often, and stop touching your face so much.

5. Washing your hair
Is your shampoo full of sulphates? Are you letting it run down your face when you shower? See my cleansing post here for more information on sulphates, they basically strip your skin, resulting in either tight, dry skin, and oily, spot prone skin. Most conditioners also contain silicone, to make your hair appear shiny and smooth, but it creates a coating on the hair, and does the same on your skin, see my moisturisers post here for more info.
Tilt your head back whilst rinsing product out of your hair, to avoid it running down your face.

6. Towels
Same as your bedding, towels need to be cleaned regularly, to keep bacteria at bay, also when you dry your face, pat it dry, don't vigorously rub it to death. Flannels, muslin cloths (any type of face cloths really) used for cleansing, should be changed every time you use them.

Hopefully this will help if you are prone to spots, now I'm off to clean my brushes, change my bedding, and clean my phone...!

Sleek Make up palette

Sleek Make Up: A mixed Review

Thursday, April 14, 2016

There seems to be a theme going in my last couple of posts, I seem to have accumulated some new make up items all at once!

Today I'd like to show you a couple of items I picked up fairly recently, and to be honest, it's a mixed review.

The first item is the Sleek Face Form Contour Kit in 'Medium'. It's pretty inexpensive at £9.99 for three powders, and is available at Boots, here and Superdrug, here. A while ago I needed a new bronzer, and I picked this up quickly on a whim, without really knowing anything about it. The first one on the left is a sculpting contour powder, the middle one is a highlighter, and the one on the right is a bronzer.

The sculpting powder is a good colour for contouring as it's not too warm, however I found it quite difficult to blend. I didn't get on with the bronzer either, it seemed to cling to random areas on my face and wasn't very blendable, unlike some of my other powders, and it ended up looking like a muddy patch on my face.

The highlighter is quite a nice colour, with a subtle shimmery finish. I wouldn't pick this up again though unfortunately, due to the other two not being what I had hoped for!

The next item is another Sleek palette, in 'Solstice'. It's a highlighting palette that can be used on the face, eyes and body. I love highlighters, it's probably one of my favourite make-up items, so this one easily lured me in. It's very inexpensive at £9.99, and is available at Boots, and Superdrug.

There are 4 shades in this palette, one is a cream formula, two are baked powders and one is a shimmer powder. A 'baked' powder basically means that the product started out as a liquid, and is baked into a solid powder which appears marbled. This then means there is more pigment and it is more blendable. Baked products seem to be all the rage at the moment! If anyone has heard of the (very expensive) Hourglass Ambient Lighting Palette, I'd say this is the drugstore dupe of it.

Something I really like about these is the names of each of the shades;

the top left is called 'Ecliptic' which is the cream formula
'Hemisphere' is the top right lilac baked powder
'Subsolar' is the bottom left lemony silky powder
'Equinox' is the bottom right, baked golden bronze shade.

The packaging is a lovely reflective rose gold (anything rose gold is sold on me immediately!) and it comes with a small applicator brush, which to be honest, I always throw away. I always find the applicators that come with eyeshadows and face palettes are rubbish.

The formulations are lovely, I like to use the creamy one on my eyes as an eyeshadow alone, and I sometimes add one of the other powder colours on top, as I find they stick to the creamy-ness really well.
I've been loving the golden bronze as a highlighter above my brows, and on my cheekbones, and the pale lemony yellow in the inner corner of my eyes and on my cupids bow. The only one I haven't had as much wear from is the lilac one, although I've been using it as an eyeshadow a lot recently.

This is a very affordable palette, the wear of the shades isn't amazing, but it lasts long enough, and isn't too glittery so you don't end up looking like a Christmas bauble. I'd definitely recommend this if you want that J-Lo glow (who doesn't?)