Bubbly Brush Cleaning

  Anyone who knows me, knows how ridiculously anal I am about the cleanliness of my makeup brushes and tools. My kit brushes are deep cleaned after every use,spritzed with sanitising spray at every opportunity and my personal brushes are quickly cleaned with a spray of MAC brush cleanser after every use and then every two weeks deep cleaned with baby shampoo.

  So it should come as no surprise that I am positively turned (Belfast term for practically vomiting at the sight of.) when I see brushes that are so dirty with foundation the bristles don't even move anymore, or, when I give a makeup lesson to someone who uses the same foundation brush they've had since they were 15. One that has never actually been cleaned, even when they first got it. Boke! (Belfast term for actually vomiting at the sight of.) Good brushes are expensive and if you look after them well, will last you a long time. Plus goodness only knows what bacteria lies between those icky stuck together bristles!

  Seeing Mr Koren Zander- affectionately known as EnKoreMakeup on Youtube, develop a brush soap that not only cleans your brushes effectively,but will condition them and, if you use the scented ones, leave your beloved brushes smelling sweeter than roses, really excited me. I know I know, its only soap.I need to get out more.

  The soaps are solid with a loofah attached to the bottom and come in their own wee plastic pot.Usage directions and ingredients are on the label attached to the pot. They contain a lot of oils with natural antibacterial and conditioning properties.

  First impressions were good. There seemed to be a good lot of product and they both smelt lovely. In particular the ultra conditioning one. Although 'unscented', it had a little hint of tea tree and eucalyptus which I find to be a nice refreshing clean scent.

   I used the Pomegranante one first.I wet the soap and then swirled the dirty brush around the top a few times. It lathered just enough to coat the brush. This one wasn't dirty enough to need to use the loofah side so to test that out I used my Louise Young LY34 which is a pain in the bum to clean. The loofah definitely helped to dislodge some of the foundation stuck in the middle bristles. The soap itself did a pretty good job of removing makeup from the brushes. It rinsed out well and left no residue. Even gel liner which normally needs an oil cleaner to remove from the bristles, came off quite easily.

   For the Ultra conditioning soap I used bigger fluffier brushes to test the 'Ultra' conditioning. This one lathered the same and 'loofered' the same as the Pomegranate Pro. I left the brushes to dry overnight and then checked their softness in the morning.They were clean and soft, Although I didn't feel much of a difference in softness of the brushes thad had been cleaned with the Pro Ultra soap.

 I'm pretty impressed. The soap effectively removed makeup from the brushes and left them clean and soft. However I wouldn't recommend it for makeup artists that do any sort of work other than beauty makeup, like SFX or bodypainting etc. It definitely isn't strong enough to remove that kind of product. I'd happily repurchase the Ultra Soap, it seems a little more antibacterial. I'd still spritz my pro brushes with Beauty So Clean sanitiser or isopropyl alcohol though to be sure they are well sanitised.

  The pomegranate scent didn't last, which i'm quite glad about as it got on my nerves after a while. I wouldn't use scented cleaners on my kit brushes anyways, for the same reason as the scent may annoy people. I loved that wee pot they came in. So handy for taking with me on trips, as it's a solid, it's one less thing to go in that darn liquids bag!

Overall I like the soaps, I just dont love them enough to constantly repurchase. As I said I'll probably get the Ultra one again in the future but baby shampoo and isopropyl alcohol is doing the trick for me now :)

  I purchased the Pro Ultra conditioning Brush Soap £9.50 and the Pomegranate Pro brush soap £8.50 from www.beautychamber.co.uk 

Let me know what you think if you've tried any of Korens' soaps.