I exclusively used the Lush skin care line for almost two months, and the verdict is: underwhelmed.

The facial cleansers smell great (I used three different types within the line) and are fun to use, but the breakouts became a serious problem. Some people say that this is to be expected with a new product, and I’ll suspend judgement in this case, however, 30 days is more than sufficient to “let your skin get used” to a skin care line. I used Angels on Bare Skin, Ocean Salt, and Herbalism. Of the three, I liked the Ocean Salt the best. Supposedly this one is for people with oily skin, but my dry & sensitive skin liked it the best. Gentle exfoliation left my skin feeling silky smooth. If only I hadn’t had less than desirable side effects, Ocean Salt would have gained a home in my arsenal.

The moisturizers… Well, I used Paradise Regained, Skin’s Shangri La, Imperialis, Vanishing Cream, and Ultralight.
Paradise Regained was by far the best product: the texture was silky smooth with excellent slip during application, the smell is fantastic… but. But something, I’m guessing something in the perfume contents, caused my eyes to be red, runny, and irritated. This particular mishap did not occur with the other moisturizers, but the others were lacking on so many levels, it’s not worth reporting on each. Oh, and the only one with any sunscreen (that anti-aging element we look for in good moisturizers!) was Ultralight. Blerg.

I used two of the shower soaps: Sultana of Soap, and Alkmaar.
Sultana is studded with a bunch of weird bullshit. Yeah, the soaps are natural, yeah some of them are vegan. Does this mean that there has to be a bunch of weird, unusable crap stuck to the soap (I mean, really—raisins?)? The soap itself was very nice. Creamy and moisturizing, with a pleasant smell.
I had better luck with Alkmaar. This soap is free of accoutrements, is creamy and moisturizing with a nice luxurious lather. I really liked it, and it would have lasted much longer than it did if my husband didn’t like as much as (or more than) I did. I’m probably not going to stock the shower with it, at about $8 per bar it’s a special treat, but every now and then I’m willing to splurge.

Along with all the rest, I tried a bath bomb (fine), a bath melt (fine), and a sugar scrub (fine).

Overall, I think I can happily skip the entire line, and not feel like I’m missing anything.

Read my original post on Lush here.