Posts with tag neutrogena

Neutrogena has thrown the gauntlet down at Proactiv's flawless feet. Hayden Panettiere, Neutrogena's new spokesmodel, looks pretty good!

According to the commercial we saw while watching Gossip Girl, the secret to perfect skin is Neutrogena's personalized skincare system, Skin ID.

We've been known to skip that whole "wash your face before going to bed" more than once, despite with the resulting mascara modern art pillows.

Rather than switch to black sheets, we decided to try out these Neutrogena Ultra-Soft Eye Makeup Remover Pads, thinking that a novel product would inspire us, no matter how tired or you know, boozed up we might be.

The first thing we noticed is that the jar is telling the truth. They are both soft and large. Very large. So large that they were awkward to use under our eyes and it was impossible to swipe away wayward flecks of mascara without taking off all of our mascara and under eye concealer and starting over.

There was just more pad than we needed, even to clear off a heavy night of going out makeup. We even considered cutting them in half, to make them last longer and be less wasteful.

They work great, and they are super, super soft on our delicate eyes, but so far they haven't inspired us to be more diligent in our bedtime routine. We'll probably stick with the equally effective, smaller/less wasteful seeming, and less expensive Almay Oil Free Makeup Remover Pads we usually use the morning after.

Neutrogena has developed a sunblock with the super ingredient Helioplex that takes skin protection to a whole new level (one that has considerably less peeling).

According to the website: "Helioplex^™ delivers unbeatable UVA protection. It works better to help prevent damaging UVA rays from penetrating deep under skin's surface. Dry-Touch technology absorbs excess sunscreen oils, leaving a clean, lightweight, non-shiny finish."

We hate the bother of applying moisturizer after the shower. It's messy, cold, and time consuming, the three horsemen of "Next time."

Our skin is saved by the one million moisturizing body washes with magic ingredients ranging from shea butter to glitter oil. They'll never take the place of real moisturizers, but sure do buy some time before your elbows get red and cracked.

Neutrogena Comforting Butter Body Wash is our current favorite, although for non-moisturizer related reasons. Oh, it's got shea butter, and mango and cocoa butter, so it makes you plenty soft. But we'd use it if it gave us green scales just to get a whiff of the addictive, faintly tropical, vanilla scent.

Seriously, go down to the drugstore and smell it. You will be powerless to resist the comfort of this body wash!

No doubt, everyone wants to get their hands on a Clarisonic, the facial cleansing brush that is supposed to work wonders because of its vibrating bristles. We'd like to think that we, Styledash, were responsible because we wrote about it last year and have been using it now for a year, but we'll give Oprah a little credit for mentioning it as one of her favorite things. However, the Clarisonic, as awesome as it may be, is a little expensive at $195. A year later, drugstore brands are coming out with their versions. If you can't afford the Clarisonic and were naughty enough this past year that Santa isn't going to get you one, you could try the Neutrogena Wave, which boasts a masssaging action that opens pores allowing for deeper cleaning. It's only $13.99. The other cleanser is by Dove, the Skin Vitalizer, which also uses "vibrations" of cleansing pads on the handheld device to clean skin. It's only $7.99.

Granted, we have only tried the Clarisonic, as we've been using it now for a year, and we've never tried the other two, but at such a significantly lower price point, it sure would be easy to try them both out.

If the explosion of cosmetics geared towards skin type tells us anything, it's that a one-size fits all approach no longer flies when it comes to what you put on your face.

But how do you know what your skin type is?

To figure out if you have sensitive skin, all you need is water and an hour of free time. The next time your face is make-up free and you don't have anywhere to be for an hour, you can try this at home skin test.

Start by splashing your face with tepid water ten times (no soap!). Using a dry towel, carefully pat away the excess moisture so your skin can air dry. Wait 30 minutes before returning to your bathroom mirror. Looking at your face in the mirror, furrow your brow and smile widely. If your face feels tight and you know that you frequently break-out, you have sensitive skin.

Knowing whether or not you have sensitive skin puts you one step closer to taming that confounding complexion of yours. So for those of you with sensitive skin, you should check out Aveeno, Eucerin and Neutrogena. All three companies have great product lines geared towards folks with fickle faces.

One thing is for sure, I'm a sucker for sunscreen. Other women may have a bathroom closet full of makeup and half-empty styling products, I've got about a dozen different sunscreens collecting dust on my shelves.

After flipping through T, the NY Times Magazine beauty issue, earlier today, I realized that my sunblock family was about to get a new member. This time, it's not going to be another expensive, organic, moisturizing facial sunblock or a cheap coconut-scented sport version. Au contraire -- this is a sunscreen to out block all other sunscreens. Believe it or not, Neutrogena's Ultra Sheer Dry-Touch Sunblock with helioplex now comes in a "I'll never have crows feet" SPF of 70!

And while I've heard competing opinions on whether or not SPFs over 30 perform better, I'm willing to take a chance on this one. If it turns out Neutragena Ultra Sheer is a disappointment, it can always enjoy a long life hanging out in my bathroom closet with the other sunscreens that I've given up on over the years.

Now, until I have to wash my face and change my makeup thirteen times a day, I think this is the last of the Drugstore Beauty Queen series on foundation. How much foundation can one girl possibly use?!

Okay, don't answer that.

We're talking about drugstore brands, but there are different price levels in the brands. Neutrogena is one of the higher end lines. They can do that, you see, because they already have a reputation for excellent skincare, and many of their cosmetics fall into the same "good for your skin" branding, even though we all know that makeup in general is pretty suffocating to your skin. Neutrogena's Visibly Even Liquid Makeup claims that it has been clinically proven to temporarily even out your skin tone when you wear it, and physically even out your skin tone over time. Really? Does it have some magic voodoo that will erase all the freckles, sunspots, and redness on my face? It does have a soy component and SPF, but this might be too good to be true!

To ease the problems associated with normal mascara (clumping, smearing, eye-irritation), several cosmetic companies have created alternatives called lash tints. Unlike regular mascara, which coats and lengthens with polymers, lash tints add pure pigment to your eyelashes. For folks with light-colored eyelashes, contact lenses or sensitive eyes, tints offer a natural, subtle boost to your eyes.

The best lash tint on the market is Neutrogena Clean Lash Tint. What I like most about this lash tint is the way the wand evenly coats your lashes with a gentle black pigment. The look is subtle, but it's nonetheless effective enough to add definition to even the lightest of lashes. And unlike other lash tints, which often last up to three days, the Neutrogena version comes off when you wash your face with water at night, so you wake up with fresh clean lashes, not mashed up inky spines that make you look like Betty Boop.

We might look to some of the glamour glossies for lists of the best beauty products, but Health magazine has named their choices for Best Beauty Products, that not only do their job of cleaning, moisturizing, covering up, lenthening or plumping, but are also healthy for you. They've tested hundreds of products and came up with these, everything from the drugstore to the department store:

• Best Facial Cleanser for normal to dry skin - Aveeno Ultra-Calming Foaming Cleanser ($6.99)
• Best Eye Cream for all skin types -Prescriptives Intensive Rebuilding Eye Cream ($65)
• Best Sunblock for all skin types - Neutrogena Ultra Sheer Dry Touch Sunblock SPF 55 ($9.49)
• Best Makeup - Almay Smart Shade Makeup
• Best Body Moisturizer - Vaseline Intensive Care Renewal Age Redefining Body Lotion
• Best Shampoo - Garnier Fructis Body & Volume Fortifying Shampoo ($3.79)
• Best Mascara - Ramy Triumph! Mascara Revitalizer ($19)
• Best Conditioner - Burt's Bees Grapefruit & Sugar Beet Conditioner ($8)
  
• Best Lip Moisturizer - Elizabeth Arden Ceramide Plump Perfect Lip Moisture Cream SPF 30 ($27.50)
  
• Best Hair Styling Product - PureOlogy DryShine Styler
• Best for Pedicures - OPI Feet By OPI
• Best for Manicure - Carol's Daughter Lemon Ginger Mint Manicure in a Jar ($10)
  

When it comes to cosmetics, I tend to go through them very, very slowly. Shampoos, body lotions, face creams, make-up -- they all seem to have a longer-than-average lifespan.

It's not uncommon for me to get a full year's use out of most products. The exception, of course, is sunscreen. I slather it on everyday, rain or shine, winter or summer just to make sure that all UVA/UVB rays are unilaterally rejected by my epidermis.

I admit, it's a little obsessive, but I've yet to meet a dermatologist bold enough to disagree with my practice. And so long as melanoma is among the most prevalent cancers, I refuse to feel bad about being "wasteful" about sunscreen.

Even though high-end cosmetics companies sell sunscreen for $50 a bottle, my favorite will always remain the old drugstore stand-by Neutrogena Ultra Sheer Sunblock. The difference between the Ultra Sheer and other similarly priced sunscreens is that the Neutrogena variety has a "Dry-Touch" formula that absorbs quickly and doesn't leave a heavy residue. Basically, the Dry-Touch makes it possible for you to still wear your regular daily make-up over top the sunscreen without having that late-day cosmetics melt-down. Ultra sheer is also extremely effective at blocking out harmful rays while still being waterproof and sweatproof.

I'm also fond of the smell -- light, fresh, but not so strong that people will wonder if you were attacked by an overzealous cabana boy. (Not that there isn't a place and a time for an overzealous cabana boy, but that time and place is not the office.)

Most will be satisfied with the protective abilities of the 30 SPF. I, on the otherhand, will absolutely not go outside with anything less than Neutrogena's newest addition -- SPF 55!

Remember, stay young, stay beautiful, and put on some sunscreen.