Tag: Brightening

  • Do You Need Actives in Your Skincare Routine?

    I know I haven’t been great about answering comments and questions here latelyand I’m super sorry and am working to catch up!, but since I manually approve every comment that comes through, I have still been reading them. Lately I’ve noticed one particular type of question come up more often than most. Lots of you…

  • Review: Naruko DermaLane Zero Dark Spot Brightening Renewal Mask

    I don’t break out often, but when I do, I’m off to PIH City for weeks afterwards. That’s just how skin rolls. (Straight to PIH City.) Then again, a ticket to PIH City gives me a chance to really put “brightening” products to the test. So when my experiments with a 20% mandelic acid serum convinced a clog…

  • August 2016 Empties Report

    There’s a bin on a shelf in my beauty closet where I hoard my empties until the bin is full. Then I take a picture of the containers before I recycle them. Usually that picture goes on my Instagram, but this time around, I felt I had more to say about the products I’ve used…

  • My August Skincare Hauls and Holy Grails

    After a couple of low-buy months, my wallet’s vacation has ended. My favorites need restocking and my new address apparently puts me in an Amazon Prime Free Same-Day Delivery Zone(!!!). While I normally share my hauls over on Instagram, this month’s skincare purchases revealed so much about what I’m loving these days that I thought I’d…

  • Fermentation, First Essences, and that FTE Glow: Secret Key vs. Naruko Facial Essence Review

    Years ago in a meeting room in faraway Asia, hardworking cosmetics marketers discovered that the story they’d spun, of peasant sake brewers with mind-blowingly soft and youthful hands, could sell bottle upon bottle of the novel new skincare product they were tasked with promoting. And thus, the first essence (or fermentation essence, or facial treatment essence or first…

  • On Actives and Extracts: My Anti-Aging PM Skincare Routine Explained

    Getting older is a natural, inevitable, and wonderful thing. Getting older shows that we’re surviving all the crap that life throws our way. I have very few problems with getting older and only a couple of problems with the concept of my own mortality. I just don’t want my mortality to show up on my…

  • Sulwhasoo Innerise Complete Mask: The Sad Fiddy Review

    I distinctly remember telling someone, not too long ago and somewhere public, that I hadn’t yet found a Sulwhasoo product I didn’t like. Well. Joke’s on me, because now I have. Try not to fall over in shock as I introduce you to the Sulwhasoo Innerise Complete Mask.

  • Casual Sunday: My Morning Skincare Routine Explained

    The skincare routine post is a staple of AB blogs, and I’ve done my fair share. Routine posts are challenging for me because my own routine changes constantly as I choose what my skin needs the most from my unreasonably large beauty stash. Most of the time, I prefer to document what I’m using on my Instagram instead of…

  • How to Exfoliate: When to Choose Scrubs over Acids, Plus Two Scrub Reviews

    It has come to my attention that out of the four members of the Snailcast‘s Snail Unit, I’m the only one who likes physical exfoliation. Fiddy scrubs alone. And after spending so much time writing about how to exfoliate with acids yesterday, I feel the need to speak up in defense of my precious scrubs. You shouldn’t…

  • How to Exfoliate: Multitasking with Chemical Exfoliants

    The most recent episode of the Snailcast was all about acids and how to exfoliate safely and effectively, and I’m super bummed because I wasn’t able to join thanks to moving hassles. But the topic got me thinking about acids and reminded me that I’ve been doing mine in a different way than I used to. A…