All Eyes On Her

The new deep conditioner is also crap.  That is all.

I think I finally found my favorite shine serum ever: Moroccanoil. So very yummy smelling, and I love that it doesn’t get greasy or heavy looking unless you really put gobs on.  Too bad the smell doesn’t last longer!

I must have gotten possessed the other day, because I somehow managed to make a fairly large LUSH purchase online.  And I stopped buying their stuff years ago — too much SLS, dyes, fragrances, etc. for my sensitive skin.  But they do definitely have some winners — I always wind up going back to Aromacreme, and Big is scratch-tastic and Flying Fox smells like heaven.

Well, I discovered a couple new hits this last time around.  Vanillary smells similar to my usual Comptoir Sud Pacifique Vanille Coco fragrance, but slightly less sweet; and the apparently best-selling Jungle solid conditioner bar is less of a pain in the ass than I would have predicted.  But the real show-stealer was a new cleanser meant for problem skin, called Dark Angels.

Read the rest…

My GOD does Aveda suck now. I mean, this isn’t exactly news to my regular readers, but they’ve sucked for quite some time now — right around the time that good old Aerin.  One of the ways in which they deviated from their original glory is to start offering BS marketing ploys, namely the Pure Privilege system. (Privilege my ass, when I have to pay $10 to enroll.)

Turns out this system has a teensy catch — your points expire if you don’t use the account frequently enough.  So, even though I paid my $10 for this privilege, I’m about to have my account shut down and my existing points voided.  Why is this, you ask?  Because Aveda has literally not made a SINGLE product that I can or would use, in the past TWO YEARS.

And it’s not for lack of trying, trust me.  Back when they came out with their Smoothing Collection a couple years ago, I bought the shampoo and conditioner duo to give it a try.  And it wasn’t totally horrible — it kind of made my scalp freak out, like most dimethicone-heavy smoothing formulations do — but it delivered similar results to that holiest of hair grails for me, the Redken All Soft collection.  However, it smelled so incredibly foul that even my fiancé begged me to return it!

And recently, I returned to the scene of the crime to try and buy a tiny trial-sized item just to activate my account, and I of course got into a discussion with the Aveda sales gal about the company’s downfall and crappy products.  (I can never keep my mouth shut when they start to pry or go for a hard sale.) She badgered me into buying a bottle of the Style Prep Smoother, which had a different but still bleh smell, and which TOTALLY did not work on my coarser, wavier hair.  WAY too much cetyl alcohol content for a leave-in product — it dried out my ends like crazy, despite the fact that she swore it made her hair more moisturized.  And shockingly, I hated it and returned that too.

So what’s a girl to do?  I went down to the local Aveda today since they’re having yet another Double Points Extravaganza!!! event, and I went with the intention of actually making a purchase that I would keep.  Yes, lately I’ve been missing having a salicylic acid-based acne spot treatment, so I went with the intention of checking out their relatively new acne line.  Well, my faithful three readers, guess what I discovered?

Every single acne product contains dimethicone — one of the MOST comedogenic ingredients that acne-prone people fear.  OH my GOD, how the mighty have fallen.  You can have your expired Pure Privilege points, Horst/Aerin.  I know it took me a long time to finally break things off with you, but it is SO OVER now!

Ever since I grew up, I haven’t been able to wear headbands. Fabric ones like we rocked in the ’80s, perhaps — but not the cute hard plastic ones that other girls can sport. Why, you ask? Because I have a giant head.

Yep, hats almost never fit me unless they’re adjustable or made for men, and headbands just don’t work on me. I even bought one a few months ago and dipped it into boiling water to try and re-mold it into a head-friendly shape — all I got was carcinogenic-smelling water and a misshapen headband that still didn’t work on my head.

So imagine my joy when I came across this nifty new headband with flexible tips, designed so that the bottom bits can be bent so that they don’t stab into your giant cranium behind your ears. I think I giggled out loud in Target, I was so delighted. But guess what?

IT DOESN’T FIT. The part BEFORE where the tips become flexible is still too tight on my skull. CURSE YOU, GOODY! Please don’t ever consider making a line of plus-sized clothing — I hate to think of what you’d do to a gal’s self-esteem in that department!

I’ve been using John Masters’ Honey and Hibiscus Hair Reconstructor in and off for about a year, but I never did splurge for the matching (and equally pricy) shampoo until recently. Turns out the duo is pretty awesome! Neither component of the set is particularly “reconstructing”, in my experience, but they certainly are lovely to use.

The main thing I’ve noticed since trying this duo as a complete set is that my horrible, itchy, annoying dandruff is finally at bay. (I always get a crazy scalp when the seasons start to change, and my standard Redken AllSoft only makes it worse.) For the scalp relief alone, this pair was worth it. I do wish the price tag were cheaper, though.

The Honey & Hibiscus Shampoo is surprisingly sudsy, considering the lack of SLS (and comparing it to other JMO shampoos, like their Zinc & Sage Shampoo + Conditioner or their Evening Primrose Shampoo for Dry Hair).  It felt like it cleaned my hair pretty deeply, and got rid of the silicones that tend to build up on my hair what with all the smoothing products I use.  Yet it didn’t feel like it had dried out my scalp at all, which is something of a miracle given how picky my poor head has been lately.

The one drawback is that the shampoo seems to lack its sister’s amazing honey-hibiscus scent.  (Or maybe it’s just me, and the shampoo’s scent is just lighter than the conditioner’s so it’s harder to notice.)  And neither one has a scent that lingers, which is a shame since they’re so yummy in the shower.

All in all, I’ll probably keep purchasing this duo, but only use them when my scalp acts up.  (My coarse hair begs for silicone-rich smoothing products, but my scalp always complains.)  They don’t make my hair look fabulous, by any means — they’re just nicer than the average non-smoothing duo.

Ever since Aveda discontinued their much-adored Curessence deep conditioner, they’ve been on my hit list. (That stuff was fabulous, and a cult classic — you don’t go changing/pulling something so beloved by so many! Bad form, Aveda!) But then, they’ve pretty much lost all my respect since selling out to Estée Lauder anyway.

Okay, staying on track. Despite said loss of respect, I’m still on their mailing list, and I still get occasional freebie vouchers for whatever new product they’ve come up with. A couple years ago they came out with an “alternative” to Curessence, i.e. their Damage Remedy shampoo and conditioner.  But that stuff sucked — it wasn’t nearly as moisturizing or penetrating as Curessence was.*

AAAAANYWAY, you probably didn’t come here for a history lesson!  Nope, you came for my review.  So now that I’ve taken you through all that, I’ll try and be brief: the newest stuff sucks.

Yep, they realized that the Damage Remedy duo wasn’t really cutting it compared to days of yore, so came out with a new set called Dry Remedy which included the Dry Remedy Moisturizing Treatment Masque, another new attempt at a deep conditioner (instead of just bringing back Curessence like they friggin’ SHOULD HAVE).  And the new stuff is just as non-deep as Damage Remedy was, but in a crappier way.

It’s a dimethicone-heavy formulation, and it feels fabulous when it first goes on and when you first rinse it out.  But after the hair is dried?  Frizz city.  Let me be more precise: dry, coarse, brittle frizz city, without a pleasant Aveda fragrance.  That’s right, it doesn’t even soften, at least not for me — it only felt nice while my hair was still wet.  And the smell is just nothing to get excited over — toned down compared to their old signature Aveda scents, and much more generic.  (Again, probably a new marketing thing, i.e. alienating the original customer base in an attempt to gain mainstream popularity.  Sayonara, I say.)

Anyway, can you tell I’m bitter?  Aveda was once the kind of company that I’d be willing to move to friggin’ Minnesota to work for.  (And I don’t like the extreme cold, extreme heat, or extreme lack of ocean.)  Now it’s just another faceless corporate BS front, and it really does sadden me.  But in a nutshell: don’t bother with this new product, either!

*You know the worst part of this whole discontinuation of a rockstar product?  I was complaining about this with an Aveda employee who was also a big Curessence fan, and she told me privately that they only pulled the stuff because some dumb Aveda customers were ignoring the directions and using the protein-heavy Curessence weekly treatment as a daily conditioner, and — guess what — they got weighed down by buildup and then complained.  So a handful of idiots ruined it for the rest of us!  And Aveda, King Idiot, took their opinion more seriously than that of all its hardcore Curessence fans! SIGH…

I’ve been dabbling with the idea of getting a high-end hair straightener, because I keep hearing how gosh darned amazing they are.  But the combination of a high price tag and mixed reviews with reports of shoddy wiring has always made me shy away at the last minute.  And boy, am I glad I trusted my cheapskate instinct!

I just got a mini Conair straightener for $18.99, and it’s AWESOME.  To be precise, it’s not one of the newish travel straighteners, which I’ve seen ranging from $30 to $130.  It’s just a standard sized 3/4″ flat iron, which is tiny compared to my old 2″ one.

The smaller barrel makes it much, MUCH easier to style my bangs and the shorter framing layers around my face.  Now I just use the tiny one on days I’m touching up, and I use both on days I’m doing a full-out straightening — the 2″ for the bulk of my hair, and the 3/4″ for the shorter bits.  Totally worth it, and I wound up spending MUCH less than I would have for a high-end iron.

Plus, my old Conair 2″ is two years old and still going strong, and still gets to plenty hot temperatures.  Compare that with the many CHI reviews on Folica, claiming that the fuses burn out right *after* the warranty runs out, and… I call this a wise decision, indeed.  And even if this lil’ slugger does burn a fuse, I’m out less than $20.

Ages ago, I received a swap on Makeup Alley for an Ojon conditioner. I remember using the conditioner, adoring its rich sweet/spicy scent, and being absolutely amazed at how it left my hair. However, since I was a) reluctant to pay Ojon’s high prices and b) already committed to my Redken AllSoft duo, I never really pursued the Ojon thing further. (I left it as a wishlist item on Makeup Alley, but no dice.)

I finally caved and decided to order the trial-sized versions of their Ultra Hydrating Shampoo and Conditioner with my last Sephora order. I could’ve sworn that the sample I tried ages ago was a brown-tan color, but this time around the conditioner was bright yellow. And I swear, it just doesn’t feel like the same product.

The same fabulous smell is there, but my locks are left kind of dry and unhappy with this stuff. And the shampoo is frustrating — it feels fairly drying and not all that moisturizing/frizz reducing, yet it has a really weak lather and I have to use it twice to even get my scalp clean after a mere two days of unwash. I even tried doubling this duo with Ojon serum and my standard L’Oréal leave-in conditioner (that’s meant for African-American hair, it’s so rich!) but it STILL left me feeling parched.

The verdict? No way am I spending Ojon-high dollars on haircare. Many a hairstylist has pooh-pooed my addiction to Redken AllSoft, but nothing has EVER made my hair look, feel or behave as well as that stuff. At some point, I hope I learn to just quit experimenting with other options… but until then, at least I’ve gotten smart enough to stick to the travel size options when I deviate, so I don’t go TOTALLY broke!

I was chatting with my hairstylist during my last cut, and she mentioned that she saw CHI hair straighteners on sale at Costco for around $70. Considering that they normally retail for about $200, my interest was piqued! So I got inspired and started poking around the Costco website, to see what sorts of beauty deals could be found.

In the past few years, it seems like Costco has tried to branch out into the high-end beauty market — they stock names like Kinerase, Lancôme, Shisedo , Stri-Vectin, Freeze 24*7, DDF, and Prevage, as well as some Costco-brand Kirkland exclusives by Borghese. I always knew they carried higher-end dental care, like Sonicare and some whitening systems, but I didn’t realize they’d also expanded into high-end skin and hair products.

I didn’t see any CHIs on Costco’s website, but I did see T3 and GHD straightening irons, which both look cheaper than retail (though still more expensive than I’d hoped). And I saw some other hair goodies I liked the look of, like an affordable 6-pack of microfiber hair towels, and giant bulk-priced vats of the much-praised Terax Crema conditioner.

I may have to take the plunge here — I’ve always wanted to try microfiber towels for their alleged faster drying time, but I figured I’d want several and I never wanted to splurge for a bunch of them at $30 a pop. But $15 for six — now THAT I can get behind! And while I’m not about to try Terax Crema for the first time by grabbing a Costco-sized pump bottle, I’ll definitely keep it in mind once I try out a sample someday.

I guess I always breeze through the beauty section of Costco after I grab my obligatory 24-pack of razor blade refills. I always assumed they only carried cheaper drugstore lines, but now I see that they’ve upped the ante a bit. I may have to extend my Costco shopping time in order to take in some of the affordable beauty treats! Now if only they had Clarisonics…