Orange Creme

The Mario Badescu salon has been a New York institution since it was founded in 1967. Many celebrities swear by their products, including Martha Stewart, Gwyneth Paltrow, Patti Hansen, and Jennifer Aniston. Yet when I lived and worked in New York, I never purchased any of their products. I never made the pilgrimage to the salon, though I would often peruse the Badescu counter at Henri Bendel’s. It wasn’t until I moved to Massachusetts that I decided to try their products. Ten years later, I have rediscovered how wonderful the Mario Badescu line is after a recent trip to Nordstrom’s. In my continuing quest for the perfect cleanser, the sales associate recommended the Orange Cleansing Soap from Mario Badescu for my dry skin type. For a mere $12 (and how often can one leave Nordstrom’s after only spending $12?) I decided to give it a go.

The Orange Cleansing Soap is a non-lathering cleanser, but it breaks down easily on a wet face so it’s more water-soluble than heavier cream or lotion cleansers. It bills itself as being mildly exfoliating, due to the orange extract, but I don’t see any evidence of much exfoliation when I use it. It is, however, a gentle but thorough cleanser that removes dirt and makeup well. And the best part is that it is completely non-drying. My face feels incredibly soft after I use it.

My skin has changed a lot since I first tried the Mario Badescu line ten years ago. Back then, I was battling chronic adult acne, and I tried a couple of different Badescu cleansers that, in hindsight, might have been too harsh for my skin. The Orange Cleansing Soap is not one of the “star” cleansers of the Badescu line, compared to the more highly touted Seaweed Cleansing Soap or Glycolic Foaming Cleanser, but it’s an unsung hero, and one of the hidden jewels of the line. This might possibly be my “holy grail” of cleansers.

Mario Badescu products are available online from www.mariobadescu.com and Nordstrom’s.

Lucky No. 7

Spring is only four days away, but the temperature outside today was in the low twenties. Add to that a very gusty wind, and my face is feeling weather-beaten. In my constant search for a cleanser that won’t strip my skin, I’ve switched from foaming cleansers to lotions, milks, and creams. As mild as they are, however, most of them still require water to remove them. I was even using cold cream with a warm washcloth in an attempt to keep my skin soft. While it worked, I have started to wonder if I should stop using water on my face altogether.

Contrary to popular belief, water can dry out your skin. It’s surprising, since water has a pH of 7 and is thus neither an acid nor a base, but is neutral. So how can something that’s neutral be potentially harmful? After splashing your face with water, the water evaporates. As it evaporates, it strips your skin of its natural oils. I have heard of people with skin so sensitive that they can’t wash their face with water at all, but those people are extreme cases. For most of us, it’s okay to wash your face with water, between one and three times a day, depending on how your skin reacts. If you wash with water more frequently than that, however, you run the risk of drying out your skin. This winter my skin has been looking dull, and I’ve developed redness in my cheeks that aren’t due to rosacea. I suspect it’s a combination of the cold weather and the drying effects of washing my face.

I recently purchased No. 7 Beautiful Skin Cleansing Balm – Dry/Very Dry Skin ($8.49) by Boots, the renowned British drugstore chain. In the past I’ve tried their Radiance Boosting Hot Cloth Cleanser, but that, too, requires removing it with water. Plus, it was very thick and highly fragranced. When I think of the words “cleansing balm,” I think of a thick, translucent waxy or petroleum-jelly-type substance, but the No. 7 Beautiful Skin Cleansing Balm is like a cold cream in a tube. It is meant to be wiped off rather than rinsed off. That’s why it appealed to me. It’s not as thick as cold cream, but it’s thick enough to spread all over your face and work it in. I find I only need to use a small dollop, and as I work it into my skin it melts and spreads evenly to cover my entire face. Then I wipe it off with a tissue. Unlike cold creams and heavier cream cleansers that need to be removed with a tissue, the No. 7 Beautiful Skin Cleansing Balm doesn’t make the tissue disintegrate while I’m using it. I only need one tissue to completely remove the cleansing balm. Sure, tissues are the cheapest commodity in a skin care regimen, but it’s nice not to have one fall apart into a shredded, goopy mess as I’m using it. The No. 7 Beautiful Skin Cleansing Balm removes most makeup, but I did have to remove my mascara first with a cleansing water as it doesn’t completely remove eye makeup.

Unlike most cold creams, which contain mineral oil, water, and beeswax, the No. 7 Beautiful Skin Cleansing Balm contains glycerin, which in high amounts serves as a humectant to attracts water to the skin. Glycerin is the third ingredient in the list of ingredients for the No. 7 Beautiful Skin Cleansing Balm. The No. 7 Beautiful Skin Cleansing Balm also contains cocoa butter – a natural moisturizer – and ceramides, which protect skin against moisture loss.

After I cleanse my face with the No. 7 Beautiful Skin Cleansing Balm my skin looks fresh and glowing. The cleansing balm has a fragrance, but it’s light and pleasant and doesn’t linger. I really enjoy using it to cleanse my face twice a day. The added bonus of using it is that it only takes about a minute for me to cleanse my face, which has drastically cut down the time I spend on my beauty regimen in the morning. Which gives me more time to enjoy my coffee before I leave for work. Soft, glowing skin and less time spent in the bathroom each morning? Win/win!

Boots No. 7 products can be found at Target and Ulta, or online at www.boots.com.

Soy Joy

One summer day when I was in junior high, I went to Six Flags Great Adventure with a group of my friends. It was a friend’s birthday party, and six of us girls piled into her mother’s car for the two-hour trip from Long Island to New Jersey. I had never been on a roller coaster before, but something possessed me to go on Rolling Thunder, which at the time boasted that it was the tallest roller coaster in the world. What was I thinking? Inevitably, I got physically ill later in the day. I chalked it up to Rolling Thunder, but I was wrong. It turns out that this was the day I came down with chicken pox.

Aveeno is a beauty brand that has been around for over 60 years. The company was initially renowned for their oatmeal products, including the powdered oatmeal bath that my mother gave me to use to help alleviate the itching from the chicken pox. Aveeno has made a name for itself for effective, reasonably priced products based on the concept of Active Naturals – natural ingredients that deliver real skin care benefits. In 2004 they branched out into skin care with their soy-based Positively Radiant line of facial care products, followed by the Clear Complexion line for Acne and the Ultra-Calming line for sensitive skin. I’ve been using Aveeno’s oatmeal-based Moisturizing Bar on and off for years, and recently switched back to it because I wanted to wash my face with something gentle and non-drying that lathered, but not too much. I decided to try an Aveeno moisturizer to go with it.

The Aveeno Positively Radiant Intensive Night Cream ($16.99) is a silky cream with a unique consistency. It’s lighter than a typical face cream, but it’s not whipped and it’s not a mousse. I guess the best comparison I could make is that it’s sort of like a custard. It contains Aveeno’s Total Soy complex and vitamin B3. Soy is used as an ingredient in many skin care products because of its multiple benefits for the skin. According to soylife.com, soy helps reduce discoloration by evening out the appearance of pigments within the skin’s surface. It’s also high in vitamin E to promote healing and regeneration, and it’s high in fatty acids to help moisturize collagen below the skin. It also contains lecithin to maintain the elasticity of the skin and help prevent fine lines and premature aging. So basically, soy is good stuff.

In the interest of full disclosure I must admit that the main reason I decided to try Aveeno products again was their Positively Radiant ad campaign with Jennifer Aniston. They knew what they were doing when they chose her to be the new face of their skin care line. She exudes a sense of natural beauty and down-to-earth modesty that is perhaps lacking among many celebrities these days. After seeing a commercial with Jennifer for the Positively Radiant day lotion, I felt compelled to run to my nearest CVS and purchase a Positively Radiant moisturizer. I chose the night cream because it doesn’t have added sunscreen, so I could use it both day and night (I get my sun protection from a BB cream with sunscreen in it). So if I use Positively Radiant products, will I have skin like Jennifer Aniston?

The Positively Radiant Intensive Night Cream promises you’ll see results in the appearance of your skin in as little as four weeks. I don’t have a problem with hyperpigmentation, although I do have those pesky freckles that have plagued me since childhood. But I feel as I get older that my skin has been looking a little dull lately. I’ve only been using the Positively Radiant Intensive Night Cream for one week, but already I can see results, maybe not so much how my skin looks but how it feels. This night cream makes my face feel softer than any other face cream I’ve tried. Despite its odd consistency, it absorbs quickly into my skin. It moisturizes well, although I do use it after applying a facial oil to my skin because my skin is very dry. But the combination of a facial oil with the Positively Radiant Intensive Night Cream works like a charm to soften and moisturize my face. My face looks healthy and glowing. I’m impressed! Positively Radiant Intensive Night Cream has a light fragrance that I find pleasant but not overpowering. There have been beauty products that I liked but couldn’t use because they were too heavily fragranced, but for me the fragrance of the Positively Radiant Intensive Night Cream is refreshing and reminds me of spring, which I really need during this long, cold winter.

Aveeno’s Positively Radiant Intensive Night Cream is available in drugstores nationwide, or at www.aveeno.com.

Soy also