Catastrophe Cosmetic: A Lush Review

You could say this is part two in my Lush Fresh Face Mask reviews, with part one being here with Cosmetic Warrior. Even though I loved Cosmetic Warrior, I wanted to try out different face masks, and since I have bad skin, I opted for Catastrophe Cosmetic which claims to help skin 'when disaster looms', which is every day with me right now. 

I keep trying to make a doctors appointment for my skin but my doctors are stupid and you have to phone at 8am in the morning to try and book an appointment for 2-3 weeks in advance and I am always working in the morning! And when I'm not working, they're fully booked and I have to wait till the next week to book it! It's absolutely ridiculous, I have been trying for over a month now and nothings happening so I decided to buy another face mask. 

It retails at £5.75 which is a decent price, especially if you just buy the £1 face mask pouches you can only use once, this works out to be waaay cheaper in the long run. As is says on the lid in the photo above, it contains blueberries, chamomile, Irish moss and calamine, all of which are meant to sooth, calm and cleanse your skin. As with all fresh face masks from Lush, they need to be kept in the fridge and have a short life span, but if you use them all the time like me then you tend to use it all up near the end of its shelf life anyway.

This is what the consistency looks like in the pot, and it's more paste like than Cosmetic Warrior, which I'll probably compare to a lot in this post, since its the only other one I've used. When I first started using it it had a bit of liquid in the top, which was fine when I mixed it in with the rest of it, but now it's gone. It obviously smells like blueberries, what with them being an ingredient for their anti-oxidant purposes. So it smells nice, but a bit powdery. However if you don't like the garlic smell of Cosmetic Warrior for your bad skin, then maybe Catastrophe Cosmetic is better suited to you (sorry if the names are confusing as they both have 'Cosmetic' in them!). 

I'm not showing any pictures with the mask on my face like other people do sorry, but it covers my face evenly and looks more like a face mask usually does, with the occasional blue berry on your face. It says to leave it on for 10-15 minutes, but I usually leave on for longer, and forget to wash it off as I'm reading some blogs at the same time so its very dry when I wash it off. Unlike Cosmetic Warrior, its a bit harder to wash off. I wipe it off my face first to get all the crumbs off (am I the only one who does that?) and then it leaves a powdery substance behind which feels a bit weird, which I then wash off. It does reduce the redness in my skin but doesn't quite have the same effect as Cosmetic Warrior did on my skin. Whereas I used that in the morning or before going out for the night because it helped with applying make up, I use Catastrophe Cosmetic whenever, in the morning, day, night but usually after a shower since it doesn't do that much for me compared to the other mask. While I do enjoy using it and have seen improvements, I would recommend Cosmetic Warrior (which I reviewed here) over Catastrophe Cosmetic, unless you don't like the smell of garlic you vampires :P

Boots: Face and Hair Masks

Over the past few months I've started getting into face masks, and recently into hair masks. I love using face masks (my favourite being from Lush) but decided to try these little sachets from Boots. As you all probably know, Boots do 3-for-2 deals all the time, and I snagged these up but they only cost about £1 each. They also have another face mask in strawberry but I didn't get it as I mainly wanted the hair masks and because of the 3-for-2 thing. I will get it eventually.

With the face mask, I never use the whole of one up in a sachet as half of it will cover my face just fine and make it last longer. I've used it twice now and it's lovely. It's made up of Rosemary and Witch Hazel. I've always known witch hazel's meant to be good for the skin, but never really thought about rosemary. It obviously smells nice, and it's a thick paste which spreads evenly across your face. I left it on for a bit longer than five minutes, and it was dry and easy to wash off leaving my skin feeling lovely and soft. I don't know if it's doing anything special for my skin compared to other masks though, but I enjoy using them and find my skin does look better whenever I use them, I just have terrible skin in general anyway.

With the hair masks, well they weren't both hair masks but I'm calling them that, they both made my hair feel better. I'm trying to take better care of my hair lately, as eventually I want to donate it. It's long enough to cover my breasts if I want to go all Lady Godiva, which I won't! I used to dye it all the time since I was about 12 or 13, so that's nearly ten years I've been dying it! Okay so I wasn't bleaching it all the time, but since I've stopped it does feel and look better, and now I'm using these hair masks to help it feel even softer. I also don't straighten it much anymore, and only half dry my hair with the hair dryer.

The samphire & Sea Minerals Hydrating hair mask, and Mango & Papaya Hi-Shine conditioner both made my hair feel super soft after using them! And also a little bit shinier. I didn't use them both at the same time though, I was scared of using too much on my hair. I've adopted the less is more with my hair shampoo, but lather the ends of it in conditioner and didn't want to use anything else. Unlike the face mask, I used all of these sachets up in one go, since my hair is so long, but could probably half them if my hair was shoulder length. It really does work on my hair though, for some strange reason (probably because I use to dye it?) the hair by the nape of my neck is coarser than the rest of my hair and when shorter it has more of a kink to it, and these products really helped soften it, I can't stop running my hands through my hair!

So if you fancy having little mini spa days for cheap, pop into Boots and get these. They're fun to try out and I might get them every now and then, but will probably invest in products that have a few goes in them in the long run rather than buying little sachets all the time. And if you would like some for free, they're also part of my giveaway, check it out!