Product Review: Precleanse by Dermalogica

My first product review!

Precleanse by Dermalogica is my absolute favourite product of all time. Period. In a world where wearing make up every day, all the time is a fact of life, its easy for it to become trapped deep within our skin, clogging our pores, causing breakouts, dulling our complexion and stopping our skin from 'breathing' properly. To combat this, Dermalogica formulated Precleanse as a first step to clean skin.
                                                      

Precleanse is cleansing oil made from over a dozen different botanical oils that work in perfect affinity with your skin. Yes, I said a cleansing OIL! It has been drilled into use time and time again that oil is bad and will cause breakouts, it clogs pores and blah blah blah. This is frankly rat patootie. The oils in Precleanse are specifically chosen and blended to work in natural harmony with your skin to clean deep into your pores without blocking or clogging.

The basis of the effectiveness of Precleanse is based in an essential law of chemistry. Like substances dissolve like substances. Most foundations have a oil base to help them adhere to the skin and even the ones that do not, still feel oily and waxy after many hours of wear. This is due to the natural secretions of oil by the skin. (The oil secreted by the skin is called sebum, and is essential to the skin. We never, EVER want to strip it away for any reason. Stripping your skin will cause more harm than good.)

Precleanse's unique formulation allow it to effortlessly dissolve when the heaviest, waxiest, most waterproof make up with a 1 minute massage. After using Precleanse, the feeling on your skin is the complete opposite of what you would expect: it isn't oily. You are simply left with soft, supple, clean, smooth, hydrated skin.

Product breakdown:

Ingredients: Apricot kernel oil, Borage seed oil, Rice bran oil, Sunflower seed oil, Safflower oil, Lavender oil, Orange oil, Vitamin E, Tomato extract, Grapefruit peel oil, Mandarin oil, Lavandula oil.

How to use: Apply about teaspoon of Precleanse on dry hands to a dry face. Massage over the entire face, including lips and eyes. After around 20-30 seconds, moisten your hands and continue massaging until the product reaches a light emulsion. Rinse off and cleanse again with your normal cleanser.

Smell: Precleanse has a beautiful smell of light botanicals with noticeable base notes of citrus. In short, it is cleansing heaven.

Feel: Precleanse does have a strange feel for most the first time they use it. For most, cleansing with oil feels absolutely wrong; but even the most skeptical of skeptics cannot deny the beautiful clean and supple feeling Precleanse leaves after you rinse it off.

Pricing: $65.50, 150mL rrp. This may seem expensive but works at less than 50¢ per cleanse and should last around 4-6 months using once per day.

Final thoughts: A spectacular product that no makeup wearer should be without in their bathroom.

Learn more at http://www.dermalogica.com/au/html/products/precleanse-1.html?type=function&cat=cleansers. All pictures and information is at the credit of Dermalogica®.

~Lykos Nightwolf

Brands, Products, Ingredients... Oh My!

My first post, hopefully not my last! I've decided I'd start with my theories regarding skin care and cosmetics in general.

To begin, I don't love any brand. I might even go so far as to say I hate every cosmetic brand in existence, but that may be a bit harsh. What I do love is the products that each brand produces; perhaps not every product, in most cases just one or two. This is what skin care is to me. The products that treat your skin, not the brands that sell them.

To go even further into my skin care philosophy is my absolute worship for ingredients in skin care products. The way they interact with the skin, how they work, why they do what they do. The chemistry, the physics, the biology of skin; that is my true undying passion. You'll notice in my future blog posts that I'll go extremely in depth with regards to how a product or an ingredient works in the skin.

If I write an in-depth review of a product, you can be confident in the fact I have done my research, going so far as to contact the company that made the product, demand to speak to their cosmetic chemist and ask my question directly to them. Yes, I have done and will continue to do this. If a company makes claims about their products, I want to know EXACTLY how the product can accomplish those claims.

My aim with this blog is to educate my fine readers in the art of caring for their skin, especially choosing the correct products for them. Don't assume if you use one product from a range or brand that you must use all the other, corresponding products. Lies and slander, I say! In some cases it may be beneficial to use an entire range, but more often than not, it is a simple marketing ploy for bigger $$$.

In the future with this blog I'll be uploading videos of unique ways to use products. Things I get asked a lot are the correct ways to cleanse your skin, how to use a scrub to its maximum potential, how to apply concealer and so on, so forth.

My blog posts will range in 4 main topics:

Products reviews. In these posts, I'll focus on a single product and break it into bits. The ingredients, claims and uses of the product will all be put under the microscope.

Ingredient breakdowns. These will be shorter posts outlining a certain 'buzz word' ingredient in skin care currently. Beware of many sciences!

Product archetypes. These will be very general post based on a certain type of product (cleanser, exfoliant, foundation etc etc.) What, how, when and why basically!

Skin knowledge. These posts will be pretty science-y and involve looking at certain skin types or conditions, how they are caused and what you can do to treat them.

Well, thanks for reading! Feel free to email me any questions or comments about anything you read at lykos.nightwolf@gmail.com

Keep smiling,
~Lykos Nightwolf