Snowman Bath Melt Tablet

Winter always reaps havoc on my skin and my mood, which is why I am seriously thinking about moving to another continent in the next year or two. You'd expect someone who has lived in England for 33 years to be hardy when it comes to the rain, snow, sleet and ice. However, I've always gravitated towards the heat, and feel so much better in my skin that way, so it was only a matter of time before my home country evicted me for good.

Unfortunately, my frozen-over brain forget to check that all of the recent limited edition bath melts were vegan before I began using them, which is why I was rather irked off when I used Snowman Bath Melt Tablet the other night only to discover that it contained beeswax after I had already indulged in the bath. These things happen from time to time, and all I can do is be grateful that I can at least give an extra review that wasn't supposed to be written. 

As with all of Lush's seasonal 'tablets', this bath melt stands at about 9cm in width, 6cm wide, and about 5mm thick. As far as bath melts go, this one is beautiful to look at and looks fantastic as a decoration in your bathroom. Left this way, you can expect a wonderful aroma to greet you every time you enter the room, and with a thickness little under a centimetre this is definitely one of the biggest bath melts that Lush have ever unleashed into the world. While it is definitely a very pretty experience to put the whole thing into the tub at once, I would suggest that you cut this into three or four pieces to make the most out of it.

You certainly don't need to use the entire melt in one go, and it would be far less messy breaking off pieces whilst its dry than hanging or storing the tablet once it's already been in the water. Having said that, I found that the melt dried fairly quickly after I pulled it from the water, so I didn't have to worry too much about cleaning up afterwards.

Featuring lemon and myrtle oils, this limited edition bath tablet has a sharp, zesty and very potent citrusy smell. There is something so light and crisp about this aroma and it's incredibly refreshing: perfect for any time of the year when you need something to startle you away. Interestingly, there is also an element of mint underneath this fruity concoction and this adds something rather cooling about the smell, without adding too much of a minty smell overall.

When it came to Snowman Bath Melt, I found that it didn't tend to put on much of a show in the water. The bath melt floated on the surface whilst it slowly dissolved, and then sent out little streams of blues oils that seemed to disappear fairly quickly into the water. Every so often I found myself massaging the bar itself to release the oils into the water because they were quite thick and resistant to dissolve by themselves. I think if you simply waited for the bath tablet to melt by itself, you'd probably be in the tub for a matter of hours. 

Once the tablet had melted into the water, I found that the water was left with the most subtlest shade of pale blue I think I have ever seen. There was also quite a few flecks of oils still left floating around in the water. These never proved to be a problem whilst I was in the water, but they didn't make for the most exciting of displays.

Once I exited the bath, I found that I could detect a gentle citrusy lemon smell on my body and my skin felt super soft and replenished. In fact, there was something rather supple about my skin which I hadn't noticed before I had submerged myself beneath the water, and I definitely think this had something to do with the product.

Why Lush decided to bring these little beauties out for a matter of days before they disappeared for good, I will never know. However, why I didn't then verify that this one was vegan before using it is probably just as silly an answer. If Snowman Bath Melt Tablet ever makes a reappearance, I would definitely be tempted to buy myself another one...only if it was to be made vegan obviously.

Quantitative Ingredients: Fair Trade Organic Cocoa Butter, PEG-7 Glyceryl Cocoate, Sodium Bicarbonate, Potassium Bitartrate (Tartar), Fair Trade Shea Butter, Beeswax, Cupuaçu Butter, Perfume, Sicilian Lemon Oil, Myrtle Oil, Titanium Dioxide,* Citral,* Limonene, Cl 42090, Cl 42090: 2.

Vegan?: No.

2019 Price: £5.95 each. 

Year Of Original Release: 2019.

Frangipani Glove Hand Serum

If there is one part of my body that suffers the most, it is my hands. Having to endure seven days of hard grafting at work, as well as then having to lift increasingly heavy weights seven days a week at the gym, my poor little mitts are just about done by the end of the day. Endless pots and tubes of hand creams later and the skin on my palms is still as cracked and as weathered as an old house. It would have to take something miraculously to bleed some life back into these tired hands.

Bring forth Frangipani Glove Hand Serum: a product that certainly didn't inspire me to get that excited when Lush first announced that it was coming out. Even when the oval shaped disc of oils and butters appeared on my doorstep, I still wasn't interested enough to start using it right away. Silly really, given that the results it did heed now leave me wishing I'd bought a hundred more before they disappeared from the website. 

Described as a hand serum, Frangipani is ultimately a little like a massage bar for the hands, and works in a slightly different way to that of a cream. With quite a number of hand creams, you often need to massage the product quite rigorously into your skin and then wait for it to fully absorb before you can carry on about your day. This hand serum works a little differently, and is ultimately more successful.

You only need to massage for a split second between your palms for the product to begin melting and heed enough oils for you to use on your skin. Frangipani melts extremely easily so I would recommend that you store it somewhere cool in between uses, and try not to hold it too long either, as the bar will shrink far quicker than you would want it to.

Once the product is on the skin, you simply need to spread the oils out across every area of your skin and the work has been done. Instead of the oily, greasy feel that you may experience with creams and lotions, this hand serum dries into a powdered finish so you can get back into whatever it was you were doing mere seconds before you applied the serum. 

What is amazing about Frangipani is that I was not expecting the product to make that much of an impression on my skin, and I instead found that my hands felt instantly hydrated, smooth and far more moisturised after only a matter of seconds. Before and after my gym sessions, I have been applying this hand serum religiously, and have found that I rarely develop any areas of dry skin, whereas beforehand I would have areas that felt constantly dry and hard, no matter how hard I tried to rectify this.

After using this daily for a couple of weeks, I also found that the areas around my nails, as well as the cuticles themselves, were far softer and smoother, and I had less 'flaking' of skin as I had done previously. Featuring almond milk and castor oil to help form a protective barrier across my skin, and witch hazel extract to soothe and tone, this limited edition is definitely a miracle in my eyes. 

Fragrance wise, Lush describe this as being rather fruity, with both sandalwood and tuberose underneath to add both woody and floral tones. To my nose, I'd describe the scent of this to be more on the warming but gentle floral side, although I do agree that there is something delicately woody about the aroma as well.

Although I didn't find that the fragrance of Frangipani lasted all too long on my hands, the intensity of which it improved the condition on my skin, and in such a short space of time, means that this is a product I have integrated into my regular routine. Carrying it around in one of Lush's silver tins has been a godsend for me whilst at work, and I've also taken it with me on board a couple of plane rides, where I've used it as a facial serum as well, with positive results.  

Having used my bar consistently, multiple times a day for almost a month, I can safely say that a bar of this hand serum will easily last another couple of months, making this great value for money. In my opinion, this is easily the greatest hand product that Lush have ever made and I only hope it becomes a permanent in the near future. This is one that I will definitely buy again.  

Quantitative Ingredients: Illipe butter, Murumuru Butter, Cupuaçu Butter, Almond Milk, Organic Shea Butter, Arrowroot Powder, Silica Almond Oil, Sunflower Wax, Witch Hazel, Extract Organic Castor Oil, Perfume, Japan Wax, Frangipani Absolute, Tuberose Absolute, Sandalwood Oil, Rose Wax, Benzyl Alcohol, Benzyl Benzoate, *Benzyl Salicylate, Butylphenyl Methylpropional, Cinnamyl Alcohol, *Citral, Coumarin, *Eugenol, *Farnesol, Geraniol, *Limonene, *Linalool.

Vegan?: Yes.

2019 Price: £8 for 100g.

Year Of Original Release: 2019.

Hi Ho Silver Bath Bomb

  

I think I felt as shocked as a lot of other people did when they first saw the price tag and realised how small this little bath bomb actually was. My initial reaction was a combination of wondering whether Lush had made a mistake on the website; if the company were in fact playing a huge joke on the committed fans amongst us, who will buy near on everything; or if this bath bomb had a miracle cure inside that I was about to find out. 

Ultimately, not one of the above ideas were realised during my experience of this bath bomb and I learned pretty quickly that Hi Ho Silver was just in fact a rather expensive bath bomb. Having said that, this is definitely not a terrible bath bomb by any means, and here's why:

Firstly, I will start by saying that despite how minute this bomb is, the scent you get when unleashing this into the water is beautiful. Olibanum, lime and orange oils go into creating a rich, slightly exotic and very resinous fragrance. The olibanum oil makes the smell of Hi Ho Silver very alluring and warming, and it comes across as rather smoky when it's dissolving in the water.

However, both of the citrus notes also make their presence known: offering very dry but equally slightly bitter fruity layers. Now don't get me wrong, there is nothing juicy or zesty about this aroma at all. In fact, the latter two components almost seem as if they've had the fruitiness knocked out of them. Instead, the lime and orange smell slightly dry and sour, which when combined with the olibanum makes for an interesting twist. I'd even go as far as to say that the smell of this bath bomb has an almost grape-like note to it.

What is impressive about Hi Ho Silver is how much of an incredible show it puts on in the tub. Within milliseconds of dropping it into the water, it begins to send out thick frothy purple streaks that shimmer slightly because of the inclusion of the silver lustre. As the bath bomb continues to dissolve, more and more trails of silver begin to decorate the surface: intertwining with the purple to offer a beautiful visual as you're submerged beneath the water. 

As the bath bomb sinks further, the silver stamp on top - which is made from creamy cocoa and shea butters - starts to dissolve into the water and adds an extra boost of moisture to the experience. What you are left with is a wonderfully translucent (and equally softening) purple water with a shed load of silver lustre pulsating under the surface.

For those that may be put off by the latter point, I should probably add that none of this lustre makes its way onto your skin during your bathe and you only need to rinse the bath for a few seconds afterwards to help the lustre disappear down the plug hole.

What I found was that Hi Ho Silver was really moisturising on the skin, and the condition of my body, especially in regards to my hands and feet, were noticeably smoother after my bath. The wonderful bath art that it created was also rather entertaining, and rather impressive given how small the bath bomb is. 

Having said this, I found that the fragrance didn't seem to stick around as long as many of Lush's other bombs, most notably the Goldrush Bath Bomb, which offered far more in the way of scent even though it was just as small as this one. Ultimately, this is a lovely addition to Lush's bath bomb collection but one that I feel is a little on the expensive side for what it offers consumers in the water.

Quantitative Ingredients: Sodium Bicarbonate, Citric Acid, Synthetic Fluorphlogopite, Titanium Dioxide, Fair Trade Organic Cocoa Butter, Lime Oil, Olibanum Oil, Brazilian Orange Oil, Cream of Tartar, Water (Aqua), Fair Trade Shea Butter, Almond Oil, Dipropylene Glycol, Laureth 4, Sodium Coco Sulfate, Cocamidopropyl Betaine, Tin Oxide, Benzyl Salicylate, Hydroxycitronellal Isoeugenol, *Limonene, Perfume, Colour 42090, Colour 77742.

Vegan?: Yes.

2019 Price: £5.95 each.

Year Of Original Release: 2019.

coming soon!

Cookie Dough Lip Scrub

I haven't met a single person who doesn't love the idea of eating cookie dough, and to be honest I couldn't imagine getting on with anybody who disliked it enough so say so. While my sweet tooth is usually satisfied with the daily protein shakes I fuel my body with, finding my willpower to not eat an entire raw batch is harder than squatting my body weight at the gym.

For this reason, I wasn't at all surprised when the Lush community went a little crazy over the Cookie Dough Lip Scrub, when it first made an appearance in the Liverpool Store. I can't deny that I wasn't at least a little intrigued myself to see how close the smell and taste replicated actual cookie dough. Strangely, I found that the fragrance didn't remind me of the sweet treat at all, but that's not to say that it wasn't delicious.

As with every one of Lush's lip scrubs, the key ingredient is caster sugar: a natural exfoliant that not only removes dead skin and debris from the lips, but helps to make the process a little more tasty and enjoyable. Along with a few essential oils, this little scrub will hydrate, soften and plump out your lips, with regular use, and leave them noticeably smoother and healthier.

Alongside the sugar, Cookie Dough contains shea butter, hazelnut oil, vanilla absolute and carob resinoid: a handful of ingredients that go into producing one of the most wonderfully mouth-watering products that the company currently offer. This lip scrub is definitely very dessert-like to my nose, but wouldn't remind me of cookie dough if it hadn't been given that name.

When sniffed up close, there are two prominent notes. Firstly, there's a strong, almost slightly nutty note of the almond oil, which I happen to think is the strongest component of this scrub. Alongside this, there is a sweet and very warming note of vanilla absolute, with just the slightest bitterness of the carob resinoid to finish. 

If I was to compare it to any sort of pudding I've experienced, I would say it is far more in-keeping with the likes of a vanilla and almond sponge; or a bowl of vanilla custard with a cacao and almond sauce over the top. Maybe I've been making my cookie dough a different way all of these years, but none of my batches have ever matched the smell of this lip scrub.

What I will say is that, on the lips, Cookie Dough tastes like a piece of vanilla fudge, and I can see why it would be very easy to eat more than the intended purpose of the product. However, when it comes to the fragrance of the whole scrub, there is something slightly bitter about it that doesn't sit well with me as well as I was expecting it to. Either the hazelnut or the almond oil is a little too strong in the mix, which prevents this scrub from being as yummy as it potentially could have been.

Having said that, Cookie Dough works exactly as you would expect a lip scrub to do, and heeds great results. You simply need to scoop out a tiny amount with your finger - rubbing the scrub all over your lips in a circular motion. The best part is that you then need to use your tongue to lick off the excess sugar, which leaves your lips looking less parched and weathered, and feeling a whole lot better than they did a few seconds beforehand. 


Although this process is completely safe, and the scrub is intended for consumption, I wouldn't suggest that you scoop out masses and eat it by itself (although we've all been tempted!). While a small amount on the lips does taste rather yummy, I can safely say that these scrubs don't work as a replacement for a regular dessert; there is still something 'soapy' about the taste of this, if too much is ingested.

Overall, Cookie Dough Lip Scrub is another great variation from Lush, but one that I wouldn't claim to be my favourite. At the risk of repeating myself, the taste of this is very dessert-like although not at all like the cookie dough I have sampled in my time. As one of these tubs tends to last almost a full year, I don't really have any need to buy another one. 

Quantitative Ingredients: Caster Sugar, Organic Jojoba Oil, Granulated Sugar, Fair Trade Shea Butter, Hazelnut Oil, Fine Sea Salt, Vanilla Absolute, Almond essential oil, Balsam Fir Resin, Carob Resinoid, Gardenia Extract, Pistachio Oil, Cocoa Powder, Titanium Dioxide, *Limonene, Flavour.

Vegan?: Yes.

2019 Price: £2.95 each.

Year Of Original Release: 2019.

Easy Peeler Body Scrub

While it may not exactly be the healthiest habit I have, there is something about giving my skin a good scrub, before I head to the gym, that sets my day off right. Even when I can see that my skin is a little parched in the morning, I still find so much enjoyment knowing that I'm removing all of the dirt and debris before my day out in the world. 

When the description of Easy Peeler Body Scrub reached my ears and eyes, I just knew that it would be revered in my house. What I didn't realise was just how much I would fall in love with this scrub, and claim that it is possibly one of my top three favourite Lush scrubs of all time. These are serious accolades guys!

This brand new exclusive product is everything you could possibly want in a scrub. Packed full of key ingredients to tone, replenish and infuse your skin, this solid beauty also delivers a fragrance worth salivating over time and time again. If you're as big of a citrus fan as I am, you'll need to purchase one of these before you get to the end of this sentence. 

As the pictures demonstrate, this little scrub is designed to look like the very fruits that have gone into making this marvellous. Tangerine and mandarin oils are what gives Easy Peeler a magnificently strong, rich and very fruity aroma. Like biting into a perfectly ripe orange, the fragrance you experience with this one is as sharp and refreshing juicy as the fruit itself. 

Alongside these two oils, Lush have also indulged our skin with a helping of both mango butter and apricot kernel oil to help moisturise and add to the aroma; and orange peel to give the scrub a tangy note whilst also helping to protect your skin after it has been buffered.

To use, you simply massage Easy Peeler across the skin in a circular motion; applying as much or as little pressure as you'd like, to scrub and buffer your skin to your heart's content. What I would recommend, as I always do with solid scrubs such as this, is that you should try not to hold this under the running water for too long. By stepping outside of the shower whilst working this product across your body, will mean that you'll increase its lifespan and get more uses for your money.

The scrub itself is quite a scratchy one, just like the Dirty Body Scrub that I reviewed recently. However, the inclusion of so many butters and oils means that once you've rinsed away the product, your skin already begins to feel super soft and smooth. Furthermore, there is something super refreshing about so many citrus oils being applied to your skin, that you'll notice almost a radiant glow about your body that wasn't there before.

As if the delicious fragrance wasn't enough to enjoy in the shower, I could still detect this on my skin almost an hour after I had towelled myself down. You may find it difficult not to want to lick your skin, because of how fruity the scent is that is left behind. However, I speak from experience when I say that you WILL NOT taste like a Solero ice cream. Sorry to dash any dreams!

Having used Easy Peeler over the last couple of days, it's safe to say that this robust scrub will last a while, so long as you keep it somewhere dry in between uses, and buffer outside of the running water. All I can say is that this little beauty needs to become a permanent product, or else somebody might just see the fruity side to my personality!

Quantitative Ingredients: Granulated Sugar, Fair Trade Organic Cocoa Butter, Sodium Bicarbonate, Potato Starch, Organic Shea Butter, Sodium Coco Sulfate, Cream of Tartar, Fresh Apple Pulp, *Limonene, Sicilian Red Mandarin Oil, Tangerine Oil, Bergamot Oil, Apricot Kernel Oil, Mango Butter, Orange Peel Wax, Water (Aqua), Cocamidopropyl Betaine, Sodium Lauryl Sulfate, Hydroxy propyl methyl cellulose, Sodium polyacrylate, *Citral, *Linalool, Perfume, Colour 15510, Colour 19140, Colour 42090.

Vegan?: Yes.

2019 Price: £4.95 each.

Year Of Original Release: 2019.

Strawberries And Cream Bath Bomb

It has been a matter of years since I began throwing the idea around of a Yummy Mummy scented bath bomb. While consumers have already been privy to the very popular Roller Bath Bomb, there was something about it that didn't give me the full Yummy Mummy experience I was hoping for...although that's not to say that Roller wasn't amazing!

After using Strawberries And Cream for the first time, it suddenly clicked that the 'missing ingredient' in Roller was the limited amount of sweet, fruity strawberry goodness that came through. I found that the floral element was a little stronger in that format whereas this brand new creation has hit the spot on every single level.

Firstly, I should point out that this bath bomb is a little on the small side, and while it's priced up £2 less than most regular bombs, it's still a little expensive for, what is ultimately, a one-use product. However, Strawberries And Cream offers you everything that you'd expect from a normal sized ballistic, and actually performs far better than many of the recent bombs I have bathed with.

Sharing its scent with Yummy Mummy, this gorgeous little fruit-shaped bath bomb offers a wonderfully fruity and super rich strawberry aroma. Being Lush, it definitely doesn't have a synthetic smell. However, the fragrance reminds me very much of strawberry sweets: if the sweets were made with real, fresh strawberry juice.

Underneath this, the olibanum oil adds a rich, sultry sweetness, whilst the geranium oil gives a little hint at some musky floral tones as well. Perhaps I'm a little biased but this aroma just makes me salivate, and I happen to think that Lush have replicated the scent of the shower cream almost identically to that of this bath bomb.

In the water, the little beauty gets to work at sending out gorgeous, vibrant waves of bright red colour: a shade that stays prominent throughout the whole experience. Even better is the thick centre made from various oils and butters, that dissolves slowly in the water like a regular bath melt, and turns the water into a stunning, velvety-soft haven of scent and moisture. 

After only being in the water for about five minutes, I found that my skin had noticeably improved and my body remained this way for the whole entire day. I didn't need to moisturise, and I didn't want to anyway because Strawberries and Cream left a delicate note of strawberry and vanilla on my skin afterwards.

This cute little exclusive is simply incredible and one that I will definitely be buying again, once I have gone through my entire stash of other bath bombs. At the risk of repeating myself, this bath bomb does everything that you could ask it to do, and it's a real pleasure bathing with it.   

Quantitative Ingredients: Sodium Bicarbonate, Citric Acid, Fair Trade Organic Cocoa Butter, Water (Aqua), Olibanum Oil, Bergamot Oil, Geranium Oil, Black Pepper Oil, Cream of Tartar, Strawberry Powder, Fair Trade Shea Butter, Laureth 4, Sodium Laureth Sulfate, Lauryl Betaine, Dipropylene Glycol, Benzyl Alcohol, Hexyl Cinnamal, *Limonene, Perfume, Colour 14700, Colour 47005, Colour 45410, Colour 42090.

Vegan?: Yes.

2019 Price: £3.95 each.

Year Of Original Release: 2019.

coming soon!

Dirty Body Scrub

One of the reasons why I never write off a fragrance family - no matter how much I may dislike it in the beginning - is because there often comes a time when a particular product showcases the scent in a new light, and then I come to appreciate the smell a little more. One of those moments happened when I tried Lemon & Ginger Beer Bath Bomb out for the first time, and a second example is with this body scrub. 

While I have never disliked the Dirty smell, I have always found it to be a little bit too masculine for my tastebuds. Not only that but I find mint scents to be rather uninspiring, especially compared with the many wonderful fragrances that Lush have on offer at any given moment. Yet, there was something about the design and versatility of this recent release that grabbed my attention far more than any other product with this scent, and I have been well and truly won over by how wonderful it has worked on my skin.

Designed to look like an actual sponge scrub, this Lush Labs release is one of the many products that are currently being sold as exclusives in the Lush Liverpool store. Almost the same size as a playing card, with a thickness of just over 1cm, Dirty Body Scrub is a hefty block of shower goodness. In fact, you would probably hurt somebody quite considerably if this was accidentally dropped from a large height, onto their toes.

As you would imagine when reading the ingredients, the main thread of scent here is one of spearmint. While refreshing and cooling, I wouldn't describe the fragrance of this as being as potent as spearmint usually tends to be: instead offering something quite crisp and gentle, with a rich woody note of sandalwood underneath. Finally, there's also a note of thyme present as well, which gives Dirty a deep herbal element to it as well. In fact, it is this latter component that lingers on your skin for the longest time afterwards.

What is great about this scrub is that there are two sides to choose from, and either side offer something a little different, depending on what your intention is. The green half is packed full of sugar and cupuacu butter so that you can really give your skin an intense scrub, depending on how rough you like it (ooh er!) 

After using this a couple of times, I have found it easiest to step away from the running water and massage this in circular motions around the areas of the body that you wish to buffer. The sugar is rather scratchy and gets to work immediately at removing dirt and debris. However, I wouldn't describe this as being particularly coarse, and you're able to apply as much or as little pressure as you wish. 

On the other side, the yellow part contains ground rice for a much gentle scrub, and you can also use this side to moisturise your skin after you've exfoliated your whole body. I found that it was this side that tended to leave the Dirty fragrance on my skin, and it lingered for a short while afterwards as well. My skin felt super soft and smooth after using this, and I was able to carry this condition with me all throughout the day.

Despite its size and rigidity, Dirty Body Scrub will still dissolve very quickly if exposed to too much liquid. For this reason, I used it away from the running water and noticed that my bar has only the slightest of shrinking. Given its performance, I can imagine getting a good 8-10 uses out of this, and possibly even more if I decide to slice the bar into smaller, single-use pieces.

While you can never guarantee that England will ever really have a summer time, this brand new scrub does promise to offer you something cooling, relaxing and super exfoliating if the sun does decide to ever show its face. Although I'd still maintain that this is one of Lush's most masculine fragrances, there is something about this scrub that would appeal to most consumers, males or females.

Quantitative Ingredients: Granulated Sugar, Fair Trade Organic Cocoa Butter, Cupuaçu Butter, Ground Rice, Sodium Bicarbonate, Cocamidopropyl Betaine, Organic Shea Butter, Cream of Tartar, Potato Starch, Sunflower Wax, Sodium Coco Sulfate, Sunflower Oil, Perfume, Spearmint Oil, Menthol Crystals, Thyme Oil, Water (Aqua), Titanium Dioxide, Propylene Glycol, Alpha-Isomethyl Ionone, Hydroxycitronellal, *Limonene, *Linalool, Colour 47005:1, Colour 42090:2, Colour 19140, Colour 42090.

Vegan?: Yes.

2019 Price: £6.95 each.

Year Of Original Release: 2019.