If My Skincare Stash Disappeared...

When it comes to skincare, I think we can all agree, I'm somewhat obsessed. I have a bathroom cabinet that's practically overflowing with cleansers, a whole drawer dedicated to masks and enough serums, oils and moisturisers to last me a few years at least. I'm starting to cut back a bit on my obssesive collecting and it got me thinking - if I got rid of everything and had to start again, what would be on my shopping list?

Cleansers

In my cutting down I managed to get this down to three. As much as I absolutely love a lot of cleansers - seriously, I may have t dedicate a whole post to my favourites. The absolute have-to-have-it list is just these: the Una Brennan Vitamin C Brighten Cleansing Oil (shock horror), the Oskia Renaissance Cleansing Gel (surprise surprise) and a more recent love in the Tata Harper Regenerating Cleanser.

I wanted each of the products in this list to serve a specific purpose and I feel like these 3 work different enough to earn a spot in my hall of fame. The Una Brennan is a liquid consistency and is the product I reach for to remove makeup more often than not. I love the Oskia gel for a morning cleanse or a second cleanse post-makeup-removal in the PM. While the Tata Harper is a more recent purchase, I've nearly used up my travel mini and have a backup ready for when it's finished (and when you have as many cleansers as I do, that's a big deal). I'd been shying away from manual exfoliators for such a long time but this is nice and gentle but leaves the skin so soft and smooth, and the scent is so lovely.

Toners

I've pin-pointed two toner-step products that are must haves for me and, again, I don't think they'll be much of a surprise: For an exfoliating toner my pick is the Pixi Glow Tonic, it's effective and affordable. Enough said. I also love the La Roche Posay Serozinc since it's got anti-bacterial properties but also doubles up as a refreshing spritz since the mist is so fine. I think that both of these work equally well in the AM or the PM and they can be used together or separately. I have used lots of more expensive toners but I genuinely think these two are the ones I reach for the most and that they're the ones I'd be repurchasing once I've worked my way through my current beauty stock room.

Serums/Moisturisers/Oils

I've let myself have a few options here since I like to switch things up a bit. For AM, I love the Indeed Labs Hydralyron serum, the Clarins Lotus Facial Oil and the Charlotte Tilbury Magic Cream. I've spoken about Hydralyron on this blog so many times now but it's still a firm favourite for an affordable hydrating serum. My Clarin's Oil has been another one I've been quite consistent with, it's a good quality oil and it doesn't break the bank as hard as others that I enjoy and the scent is so refreshing in the morning. Then the Charlotte Tilbury cream is just lovely under makeup, I couldn't use it everyday since it's quite a rich cream and my skin isn't dry enough to warrant using this constantly but it's great when I do reach for it.

In the evening, I just love using the Esteé Lauder Advanced Night Repair serum, another product that I've chirped on about before. It's a thin jelly-ish texture and it just fixes your skin, that's all I can say about it. Although the Sunday Riley Luna Sleeping Night Oil is a very recent addition to my skincare stash, it's such an SOS saviour of a product that I know I'll be going back for more once I'm out. Finally, while the Indeed Labs Fillume moisturiser isn't something I talk about much on the blog, I've been using it for a while now and it's such a good night cream, it's really plumping on the skin and makes you wakeup looking fresh.

No Money March: The Budget AM Skincare Routine

We're trying something new today. Videos.

Now I must admit, I'm not going to be able to get a video up every week, but I've decided that every now and then I'll drop on into a regularly scheduled post slot. I'm finding that I have a lot of ideas for content that make for lengthy posts and I figured some people might want to see them in video format. :)

January Favourites

First month of 2016 is over and I've never been so glad to see the back of a month in my life. January this year brought me some big challenges but there's been some great product discoveries this month that have helped me along the way. We've also got one rediscovery in here too that I'm equally excited about. So let get into it.

My rediscovery this month was the Illamasqua Skin Base Foundation. I absolutely love this. The shade match it great, the formula is comfortable and it lasts well on the skin and the packaging is practical for travel. For a high-end foundation it's not too up there in price £32.50 for 30ml (although it was definitely more around the £26 mark when I first started wearing it so the price has crept up over the years). I use shade "03" and the shade range is really impressive. The lightest shade is white and the darkest is very dark, and the shade selection caters to everyone from the fairest of the fair to those with the absolute deepest of skin tones which is great.

I finally picked up one of the Clarins Instant Light Natural Lip Perfectors, these have to be one of the most hyped lip product ever and for good reason. I have shade "02" which is a natural pink and theres a really nice amount of shine to these. They're a relatively sheer lipgloss/balm hybrid product that are super comfortable on the lips without being sticky at all. Also - the scent/taste on these, they're lovely and sweet without being overpowering at all. Best of all? They've just introduced a berry shade into the line and I will definitely picking it up shortly.

This one won't come as a surprise to those who read my review/rave on the Urban Decay Gwen Stefani Eyeshadow Palette (here - spoiler, it's a positive one). The packaging is amazing, the selection of shades is the perfect balance between wearable and fun colours and it really caters to my "fairest of them all" skin tone. My favourite shades have been "Punk", "Zone", "Steady" and "Danger". The formulas are amazing and most of these are shades I can see myself reaching for a lot. I've picked up a few more bits from the collection so check back on Friday this week to hear more about that.

So the Oskia Renaissance Cleansing Gel has finally been knocked off the top spot. I have a review on the whole set coming up soon but the Tata Harper Purifying Cleanser has just jumped to the top spot in my skincare stash this month. The citrus-y scent is nice and refreshing for an AM cleanse and the formula is creamy and cooling on the skin. I saw a noticeable difference in my skin after using this cleanser which always puts a product on my radar. Obviously I take pretty good care of my skin so when something makes a really visible difference for me it's always impressive.

My last pick is also a skincare product and again it's one that been featured in a post recently: the Charlotte Tilbury Magic Cream. I only have the travel size for now and I'm rationing it until payday when I can go and treat myself to a full size. This is just such a lovely day cream, super moisturising, makes a nice base for makeup, smells amazing. What's not to love?

October Favourites

I can't believe October is pretty much over already (I know this is a bit earlier than I normally post my monthly favourites but that's the way the schedule fell due to other posts I've got lined up). I've been testing out a few new bits this month and I think I've found some good picks for this one.

On the make-up front, I know I gave these an honorary mention last month but I just wanted to mention that the Fluer De Force Lip Gloss has been a true favourite this month, I've worn the shade "Written In The Stars" at least twice a week since I picked it up and it's just a great fuss-free everyday neutral.

With me keeping it simple on the lips I've been going for a bit of a stronger look on the eyes and have been gravitating towards my Charlotte Tilbury Colour Chameleon in "Golden Quartz for Hazel Eyes Day" it's a great rusty bronze with golden shimmer that seems to give a subtle hint of green to the lids and I love the uniqueness of the shade. The formula is great too, nice and quick to apply and lasts well.

My final makeup favourite for the month is the Bourjois Sourcil Precision Eyebrow Pencil. I have the shade "07 Noisette" and it's a great eyebrow pencil. It's a bit waxier than other formulas and I find that I don't need to use a brow gel with this one as it's got a little hold to it and my brows aren't particularly unruly. My only bug-bare with this is that the brush on the lid is a bit pants, if they swapped that out for a good spool-y brush this would be perfect.

Possible TMI here: as it's been getting a bit colder I've been finding that my feet have been getting a bit gross looking/feeling. I've been popping on the Soap & Glory Hell Genius Amazing Foot Cream under my socks on a daily basis and it's sorted out any dryness or general winter-woes pretty quickly. A great SOS product.

For skincare I have two new favourites, one high end and one budget. For high end I've been loving the Skyn Iceland Pure Cloud Cleanser. It's a lovely, cooling creamy cleanser and while it can be used both day and night I find that the cooling sensation is just exactly what I want in the morning to wake me up.

My budget skincare find is the Nspa Oil-Free Moisture Gel, this is an insanely good product. I'd moved on to using oils instead of moisturisers 9 times out of 10 because moisturisers just weren't cutting it for me. Having oily but dehydrated skin made it really hard for me to find something hydrating enough but that wasn't too heavy or greasy to wear under makeup but this product has it down. It's a nice hydrating cream that sinks in almost immediately.

And there we have it, I still can't believe how fast this year is going.

Supermarket Skincare: Nspa At Asda

Nspa is a skincare range I've been wanting to try for ages and on a recent trip to Asda I managed to find quite a good selection of products from the range. The price point for this range is amazing with most products being £6-£8 and the range often being on a two-for-£8 offer which basically makes it buy-one-get-one-free. I love the packaging as well, for a well priced brand the packing doesn't look or feel particularly cheap.

So the first product I picked up was the Hot Cloth Polish which is a creamy hot-cloth-cleanser. I like this for a morning or second-PM cleanse as I prefer an oily texture for makeup removal and it's nice. There's definitely cleansers out there that I prefer but for the price point this is a nice product. The scent is nice and clean as well.

I find that one thing that I really struggle to find in low-cost skincare ranges is really nice serums so I decided to give Nspa's Double Action Youth Serum a go. The packing says this can be used alone or under a moisturiser and so it seems to be a moisturising serum and for me, it's just not what I want in a serum. It's very similiar in texture to the moisturiser I picked up from the range and while I don't think it's a horrible product by any means, it's definitely not the best serum out there. If you're looking for a budget serum, the L'Oreal Revitalift Filler Renew is much better and is only a little more expensive.

I love a good facial oil so as soon as I saw the Deep Hydrating Facial Oil it was finding it's way into my basket. It's nice for an evening oil but is a little too heavy for daytime wear. The scent is warming and clean again and it sinks into the skin nicely. I think oils are another product where you get what you pay for and the ingredients are obviously not going to be the same quality in this oil are they will be in a pricer product but it's definitely a good find and my skin really seems to like it.

And finally, I have the Oil-Free Moisture Gel and of all the products I picked up, this was the one I wasn't sure I'd like. Even though I have oily skin I seem to have a real hard time finding day-time moisture products that offer a nice level of hydration to my skin, without being too heavy or greasy. That being said, I actually really like this one. I'd previously been using the Clarins Lotus Facial Oil as my day-time hit of hydration and my skin loves it but I've been going through it pretty quickly and it's not particularly kind on the purse. The Nspa Moisture gel is non-greasy and feels nice and light on the skin but manages to give your skin the moisture it needs to not drink up your makeup now that the weathers starting to cool down.

So all in all a nice range. I can see myself picking up more from the range and probably even repurchasing some of the one's I've mentioned here. I dare say this has been my most succesful supermarket Skincare post to date.

Supermarket Skincare - The Skin System For ASDA

Last time I did one of these "Super Market Skincare" posts, I found a couple of nice products that I'm still using and enjoying to this day that were super affordable. With that in mind I figured it would be a good idea to bring it back and scour a different supermarket for another exclusive, affordable brand and let you know how it fairs, and today we're looking at The Skin System range from Asda.

The Skin System range is quite bitty in terms of product selection, there were a couple of products for a dryer skin type but only the oily skin type range offered a serum or moisturiser so I gave that sub-range a try. The products in the range are super affordable at £1-£2 a product and you get a good amount of product in there too. I also think the packaging for the range is nice with a colour coding system, green for their "Tea Tree" range, pink for the more nourishing range and they also have products packaged in blue which seem to be radiance enhancing.

Naturally, the first product I picked up was a cleanser and the one I chose was the 3 in 1 Mask, Scrub and Cleanser, the range did offer a foaming cleanser but it contained SLS so I promptly put it back on the shelf and went for something else. The 3-in-1 cleanser contains glycerin as a main ingredient and also has salicylic acid in which are both ingredients that my skin get on with and the 3-in-1 claim intrigued me. The product also has a light minty fragrance which isn't overpowering during use.

If you're intending to use this as a cleanser, I'd apply it to a slightly damp face as it's a bit too thick in consistency to work into a dry face and this would be your exfoliation step as well. I mainly use this as a second/morning cleanse because the scrubby particles make it no good for removing makeup. To use as a mask I'd use it exactly the same way but leave it to set before removing, it will dry down on the face like a clay mask. I think this cleanser would be best to maintain blemish free skin rather than get rid of spots you already have, the scrubby particles will just spread the bacteria in any current spots around your face and potentially make the acne worse. That being said, as a relatively spot-free person, I've enjoyed using this product and will continue to use it.

The second product I tried was the Overnight Blemish Serum. Again the product contains salicylic acid but a notable mention on this one is that the alcohol content is high, it's got the nice light minty fragrance that the 3-in-1 cleanser had, but you can smell the alcohol content coming through. The product is cooling on the skin but does leave a sticky sensation on the skin which doesn't completely disappear even after applying a nourishing oil over the top.

Also, the packaging on this product recommends that you "Apply a thin layer cleansed face or affected areas, avoiding delicate eye area", which is not something I'd do. Due to the high alcohol content, even when used under and oil and a moisturiser overnight it left my skin so dehydrated that my skin would drink up the moisture in my foundation the next day. If you are going to us this product, I'd recommend targeting your application to blemishes.

Finally, I tried the Light Mattifying Moisturiser. The glycerin and salicylic acid in this product are a little further down the ingredients list and I found this the most difficult to give a fair review of. The light mint fragrance is nice and the moisturiser has a lovely cooling sensation on application but for me the hydration levels weren't enough. I think the product would be great for it's targeted oily-skinned users but even those with combination skin will more than likely find this to not be quite enough for them.

High Street Heros - Skincare

Part two of the High Street Heros series is going to be focusing on skincare. There's a range of products in here from the products that I'm considering buying back-ups for to the ones that I don't use often but they do what they should.

So I'll get this one out of the way, because we all know it's coming: the Superfacialist by Una Brennan Vitamin C Brighten Cleansing Oil is my absolute favourite high-street cleanser and it's the product that I use to take of my make-up pretty much every night unless I'm trialling something or trying to use up other products. Love.

Another product I've mentioned a few times on the blog that's become a staple in my skincare rotation is Serozinc by La Roche Posay. It's a spray-mist zinc-sulphate solution that I use in the "toner" stage of my skincare routine and it's great for clearing up the skin if you have any break-outs or blemishes.

One that I absolutely love but I don't mention so much on here is the L'Oreal Revitalift Filler Renew Serum. This is the one that comes in the bottle that looks a little like a needle, but don't be put off by the packaging, it's lush. It's a hyluronic acid serum similar to the Sarah Chapman Skinesis Hydrating Booster and Hydralyron by Indeed Labs and while I must admit that Hydraluron is my favourite of the 3, the L'Oreal is a good pick for those with a slightly tighter budget as it's under £15.

My budget facial oil pick is the B Replenished Facial Oil. Facial oils are one of those products where you get what you pay for and obviously, this oil isn't going to do what more expensive oils do for your skin but it's a nice pick and I do use this on quite a regular basis. If you have a bigger budget a few more pricy picks I like are the Clarins Lotus Facial Treatment Oil, Sarah Chapman Morning Facial and MV Organics Rose Plus Booster.

My go-to evening eye cream is the No7 Beautiful Skin Overnight Revitalising Eye Balm, it's a lovely hydrating eye gel that does the job. I use it overnight because I think it could be a little too thick for under make-up although I must admit I haven't tried it under make-up yet.

A good does-the-job product is the First Aid Beauty Foaming Cleanser, in texture, this is very comparable to the Omoravicza Cleansing Foam and the only reason I'd repurchase the Omoravicza is because for me, smell is a big part of my skincare ritual and that's the one thing the First Aid Beauty version is missing. Other than that, it's lovely.

Speaking of First Aid Beauty, their Ultra Repair Cream, is available in a generously sized tube for under £15 and it's my miracle cream. Whenever my skin is sore or irritated or generally unhappy, I reach for this and it brings my skin back to normality. Can't be without the stuff and have recommended it to lots of people. Love.

The First Aid Beauty Facial Radiance Pads would have also had a place in this lineup, but unfortunately, they were slightly outside of my £15 budget for this post, but a very comparable product that's even more affordable is the Nip & Fab Glycolic Exfoliating Pads. These are so similar to the First Aid Beauty version but come in under the budget for a good amount of product, they're a pre-soaked acid toning pad that exfoliate the skin gently.

Another pre-soaked-pad product from Nip & Fab that I've been enjoying lately is their Dragons Blood Hydrating Pads. Now I'll admit, being a Targaryen fan girl (sorry for all non-Game-of-Thrones fans for that reference) I may have seen the Dragons Blood reference and been intrigued on the name alone, but I did notice that these also contain hyluronic acid, which we've already established is an ingredient that my skin particularly enjoys. For me these are a hydration layer that I'd use if my skin was more in need of moisture than exfoliation, I wouldn't use them in conjunction with an exfoliating toner.

I've been enjoying the Origins Drink Up Intensive Overnight Mask for a while now and was keen to find a dupe and with me being a big fan of Una Brennans Superfacialist products already, I picked up their Rose Hydrate Mask to see if it was comparable. While it's not strictly an overnight mask if you apply it thinly it soaks into the skin and wont need removing but I just use it as a 5-minute-fix and it works well. Not quite a dupe but it's still a nice pick.

And then the rest of these are products that I don't necessarily use in my rotation all the time, but if you fancied a new budget item these are pretty good. I've actually gone through 2 bottles of the Good Things Miracle Mattifier Moisturiser before developing a love for facial oils that has left most of my once-loved moisturisers feeling a little unloved. This is specifically for an oily skin and it was great at keeping you hydrated whilst also providing some oil control.

While I really love the Omoravicza Deep Cleansing Mask, it's eye-wateringly expensive and I'm currently trying out a lot of clay masks at the moment but a budget option that works well is the Aroma Actives Skincare Deep Cleansing & Purifying Clay Mask. It's an almost skin-coloured clay mask that feels cooling and slightly tingly on the skin and dries down quickly. It doesn't leave my skin as dry or tight feeling as other that I've tried but it does leave me wanting to apply some kind of moisturising product afterward but it's a nice pick for around an 8th of the price of the Omoravicza.

When I'm feeling lazy and a proper cleanse isn't on the cards I have 2 products that I whip out. The Garnier Micellar Warer is great for those mornings or evenings where you just can't be bothered, it's gentle on the skin and not stripping at all but it removes make-up and general grime from the skin quickly. I do have a confession to make here. While I don't agree with using face wipes to cleanse all the time, sometimes, a good old face wipe is just what you need. Maybe your on the road or maybe it's just been a late one and you just want to get straight to bed, but when I'm reaching for a face wipe, I'm reaching for the Soap & Glory Off Your Face 3-in-1 Daily Purifying Cloths. Remove makeup nicely, gentle on the skin but still have a slight bit of an exfoliation to them. A good one to have on hand for emergencies.

And finally, while I normally use a moisturiser/facial oil and then a separate SPF, for days when I'm in a rush I like the Sainsburys SPF 15 Day Cream. It's a light moisturiser that plays nice with makeup and has a decent amount of SPF in for the weather we usually get here in England, and it's super affordable at around £2 a tube.