Ever since my mum slipped a slice of avocado on my plate some 14 years ago, I have been obsessed with the fruit that I now call my all-time favourite food. It takes a lot of will power for me to not eat one of these bad-boys every day, and I would quite happily munch on a perfectly ripe specimen than dig into a bar of (vegan) chocolate.
In order to curb my cravings, I allow myself to purchase regular top-ups of Avobath and You've Been Mangoed Bath Melt - I figure if I can't eat these beauties every day, I can at least bathe in their goodness.
King Of Skin is a body butter that I've had tucked away for a number of months, and didn't ever realise contained avocado until I did a little research on it a few days before I began applying it to my skin. Once I discovered it was one of the key ingredients, I was really hoping it would become my new favourite product.
Containing a glorious concoction of six different oils, this solid alternative to body lotion is guaranteed to leave your skin feeling incredible. Coconut oil is the prominent oil here, a rich, nutty oil that works wonders at nourishing the body and leaving its light fragrance on your skin; tangerine and lavender oil help to soften the pores whilst, alongside the sandalwood, leaves a pleasant sweet, earthy smell.
If those oils were's enough to quench your skin's thirst, there is also fresh avocado and banana - two rich and highly nutritious natural ingredients that strengthen the skin and clean the pores without a build up. Cocoa butter and shea butter seal the deal with yet even more softening properties to give your whole body a well-deserved pamper.
So why should you opt to use a solid body butter? Firstly, by keeping the ingredients in their solid form, as opposed to a liquid state, it means that Lush don't have to include specific chemicals and preservatives to get the product to remain liquid at room temperature. Secondly, because there are only natural ingredients present in the bars, these products are great for people with sensitive skin and those that don't bode well with heavy moisturisers. Finally, keeping it in it's solid form means it is easier and more cost-effective for the company and consumer, as it requires less packaging to store.
So how does a body butter work? Well it works in the same way as a massage bar - except that you apply it onto wet skin rather than dry. To use, I just step outside the flow of my shower and massage it across my entire body. Once I've smeared enough on my skin, I then use my hands to massage it all over evenly. Then I simply rinse myself off and exit the shower.
What I discovered was that King Of Skin is a very heavy body butter, and once I had applied it onto my body, it made my skin rather oily. Although Lush recommend that you rinse it off afterwards, I think this is a rather pointless task as I didn't feel as if any of the butters so much as moved when I tried to wash myself down. In a way, it did feel as if I'd accidentally applied a massage bar.
On the positive side, once I was towelling myself down, my skin didn't feel as greasy and instead had a slight sheen to it, which made it look rather radiant. Its consistency means that your body gets a highly rich and intense all-over condition and I found that dry spots on my legs and feet had all but cleared up the day after I first used this solid bar.
However, like Buffy, I felt that it was perhaps a little too heavy for my skin. It did make my skin feel really nice and smooth but it wasn't as light as a body lotion. For this reason, it's best not to use this as a daily moisturiser - it is possible to have too much of a good thing!
Unfortunately, the one aspect that let this body butter down was it's smell. Don't get me wrong, it has a gorgeous scent. However, with all of the above ingredients present, I was expecting a creamy, vanillary fragrance not that far off Sympathy For The Skin. Instead, King Of Skin has more of a generic shea butter scent with slight elements of the almond oil and sandalwood. When using this in the shower, it's smell intensifies a little and it then gives off an almost chocolate-orange aroma, which is lovely. However, I couldn't smell any of the banana or avocado, which is the main reason why I bought this in the first place, and for this reason, I was a little disappointed.
When applying, King Of Skin melted very easily between my palms - in fact, I would warn users to only handle this bar if and when they're planning on using it immediately. The second the bar was in my hands, it began to melt, and it only took a few seconds for a thin but rather oily liquid to paint my hands. This is a product that if held too long, would disintegrate and disappear a lot quicker. In the shower, this massage bar does seem to shrink quite quickly so it's not as long lasting as Buffy or Aqua Mirabilis.
Overall, the scent of King of Skin was lovely and it did do a lot for my skin. It's a great 'pick-me-up' product for those in need of a quick full body rejuvenation but shouldn't be used very often as it's a little too rich to be a daily product.
Presented as a unique crown-shaped solid bar, this body butter is definitely one of the most effective body butters available from Lush at this moment in time, but it's not one I would be able to use regularly. I will probably aim to purchase one of these every few months, and use it sparingly - just when I'm looking for that little something extra special to pamper myself with.
Quantitative Ingredients: Cocoa Butter, Shea Butter, Oat Milk, Fresh Avocado, Extra Virgin Coconut Oil, Perfume, Organic Jojoba Oil, Almond Oil, Tangerine Oil, Lavender Oil, Sandalwood Oil, Rose Absolute, Frankincense Resinoid, Limonene, Linalool, Fresh Organic Bananas.
Vegan?: Yes.
