Crabtree & Evelyn Fruits & Botanicals Hand Therapy Collection

When this prettily packaged hand cream set dropped onto my doorstep, I admired it, thought that the metal tubes were vaguely reminiscent of L'Occitane's iconic hand creams, and then put it to one side.  When I actually cracked it open with my dry, scaly hands (thanks to some particularly stain-y pink hair dye, and some high alcohol content stain remover), I was very, very pleasantly surprised.

There are three little hand creams in the set, in Orange, Avocado and Pomegranate scents - all of which are faintly fruity but not overpoweringly so.  The real win, though, is the texture - the cream is thick, unctuous, and yet very light - almost a lotion rather than a cream - and it delivers an impressive moisturising punch.  It manages to hydrate quickly whilst sinking into the skin within seconds - I can apply this and be typing on my keyboard again within a minute, with no greasy sticky residue at all.

This set is also now discounted in the Crabtree and Evelyn sale.  It's not exactly spendy normally, costing £12 for three handbag friendly creams, but at £8.40 it's a bargain.  There's also a set with a floral theme.

Disclosure: PR sample

This post originated at www.londonbeautyreview.com. If you're reading it elsewhere, it's been stolen, violating my copyright.

Bliss launch Limited Edition Pink Glamour Gloves for Breast Cancer Awareness

 

Bliss have released a special pink edition of their famous Glamour Gloves in support of Breast Cancer Awareness.  Whilst they aren't donating a proportion of the money handed over for each pair of gloves, Bliss have made a donation to Breast Cancer Awareness in honour of the charity's work.

I've never tried Glamour Gloves before - they have a layer of hydrating gel inside them, which softens and conditions the hands when you slip them on.  The lining lasts for 50 uses, say Bliss, making them a definite luxury item - they cost £36, giving them a pretty high cost per use.  You could always use them to improve the absorption of a layer of hand cream by putting them on freshly moisturised hands, though, I guess.

Bliss are also running a Twitter based competition, asking that Glamour Glove owners tweet pictures of themselves with their pink-gloved hands on display throughout October using the hashtag #SpreadTheGlove.  The most creative picture wins its subject a pink iPad, with runners up being treated to a variety of Bliss products and spa treatments.

Find them at BlissWorld.co.uk now.

Disclosure: PR sample

Liberty London Bath & Body Range

Liberty are releasing a new bath and body range, comprising of hand wash, hand lotion, body wash, and body lotion, in typically English scents - lavender, geranium and rose.  They've caught my eye mostly because of their packaging, which incorporates an abstract, floral print which was

designed for Liberty in 1975. It's clean yet pretty, unfussy yet detailed, and would look pretty chic in any bathroom.  Prices start at £18 for the hand wash, which is a reasonably luxe price for a luxe department store.  The range has been created by Liberty's beauty buyers, so it must be of a high level of quality to match with their usual exacting eyes, and all the products are made in Devon.  Lovely stuff - I can see these products making a lovely gift.

Quick Pick: Clarins Hand and Nail Treatment Cream

I can't believe I've never heard about Clarins' Hand and Nail Treatment Cream before.  This intensely moisturising, shea butter based cream with extracts of sesame oil and mulberry is a consistent Clarins best seller - and having tried it for the first time last night, I can totally see why.

You only need the tiniest dab, with the cream's silky texture making it easy to smooth across the hands.  For something with such a light texture, it imparts an incredible amount of moisture into the skin, sinking in quickly and leaving the hands feeling soft and velvety with absolutely no residue whatsoever.  The softness lasts even after washing the hands.

Impressive stuff - the complete lack of residue makes this a perfect desk companion which won't interfere with constant typing.  My tube will be given pride of place next to my monitor!

Find it at Clarins counters and concessions, or online, where a 100ml tube costs £19.  There's also a Jubilee special edition (Clarins are royal warrant holders), which gets you a massive 200ml for just £26.

Disclosure: PR sample

New Love: L'Occitane Pivoine Flora Hand Cream

I'll admit it - despite L'Occitane's hand cream being a bit of a beauty legend, I'd never tried it before.  Thanks to a preview of the new Pivoine Flora fragrance, I finally had a go last week - and now I've tried it, I totally understand the hype.  I was expecting a thick, heavy cream - probably because of the metallic tube packaging; most heavy, almost solid creams seem to come in this sort of tube because they're easy to manipulate and roll up to get every last drop out.  The L'Occitane cream, however, is incredibly light - but still very moisturising.

Applying a small dollop and smoothing it over the hands leaves them feeling soft, silky, and totally grease free approximately thirty seconds after application.  This is pretty amazing - I've not really tried any hand creams which absorb so fast and yet leave the hands feeling well moisturised.  The Pivoine Flora scent is also relatively strong; I can still smell it fifteen minutes after application.  I'm guessing that if you wanted to do the scent layering thing, this product would be a great addition to your regime.

I'm definitely sold - and I'll be keeping my tube of Pivoine Flora hand cream in my handbag until it runs dry.  And then I'll definitely buy another tube!

L'Occitane Pivoine Flora hand cream is available now from L'Occitane stores and concessions, and online, where it will cost you £7.50 for a 30ml travel size tube.  There are also plenty of other fragrances in the line if peony isn't your thing!

Disclosure: PR sample

Review - Mitchell and Peach Luxury Hand Cream

Disclosure - PR sample

For me, a good hand cream has strict criteria to meet.

• It's got to be portable, because it's likely to live in my handbag. 
• It's got to be luxurious, so that I'll be motivated to keep using it throughout the day. 
• It's got to be moisturising (obviously), especially in harsh winter climes. 
• It's got to smell good. 
• Finally, it absolutely has to be desk-friendly. By which I mean non-sticky and quickly absorbing. There is nothing, and I mean nothing more annoying than a handcream that turns mouse and keyboard into an oil slick and prevents me from working.

Mitchell and Peach's Luxury Hand Cream scores high on nearly all my criteria. It's a lightweight, white cream in a common-sense squeezy tube with a screw-on cap. It smells divinely of lavender (one of the crops grown by the eponymous Mitchell family at their Kent estates) with a twist of rose and honey - divine. 

I'm incredibly impressed by how quickly it absorbs too. Within about 30 seconds it vanishes into the skin, leaving only a slight tacky after-effect that doesn't hamper my typing in the slightest. In fact I've just put some on while writing this review; my hands are now velvety soft and my keys are slick-free. 

The only area it falls down on slightly is moisturising. I find that it's not quite hard-working enough to keep my dry hands soft during the winter months. With frequent enough re-application I don't see this being a problem, but at £17 for 60mls that could get expensive. For summer, however, it's an absolute winner for me and I'm going to be keeping a tube to hand. The scent is very summery too, bringing to mind sun-drenched herb gardens and flourishing rose beds.

Luxury Hand Cream is available from Mitchell and Peach, costing £17 for a 60ml tube. 

Review: Dove Visible Effects Hand Cream and Body Lotion

This product was provided for consideration by Dove's PR.

I've been  putting off writing this review for the simple reason that I can't quite find the right words to describe the effects of these products.  The hand cream and body lotion both contain a new, patented ingredient (which we're reliably informed has been in development for years) designed to hold moisture at the surface of the skin.  In combination with a couple of other more widely used ingredients, the formula claims to address dryness in all layers of the outermost part of the skin.

Now, all this science-y stuff is great material for advertisements and press releases, but for me, the main question is whether the products are different (or superior!) to the hand and bodycare products I've used before.  In my experience, the answer is yes - if you're talking about mass market, basic bodycare products, these are amongst some of the nicest I've used, in terms of the softness given to the skin.

After application, there's a period of about five to ten minutes when I feel like there's a fairly noticeable residue on my skin.  The residue doesn't really dissipate with extra rubbing in, either - but after that five to ten minute period has elapsed, it disappears, and the skin is left feeling smooth and soft without any greasiness. 

This is the part I can't quite explain; while my skin is definitely not greasy, and doesn't have any form of residue, it still feels like there's something there.  It's not massively noticeable, and it isn't sticky, but it's there.  I think that this is the part that keeps the outer layers of the skin moisturised, and indeed, after washing my hands, my skin still feels moisturised and soft.  The effect lasts through a good 3 or 4 washes on my hands, and pretty much the whole day on my body.

For me, the hand cream is the stand out product; I don't use body lotion every day (mostly as I'm lazy), but I like to use hand cream a couple of times a day.  The fact that it is non-sticky and keyboard friendly makes it ideal to keep on your desk at work, and the long lasting nature of the moisture it provides far exceeds that of similarly priced beauty basics.  One slight downside to the products: they are quite strongly scented.  It's a fresh, clean, almost cucumber-y scent, but it's not particularly subtle.

If you're interested in trying either product yourself, you can find them both at Boots, where the body lotion will cost you £4.99 for 250ml, and the hand cream will cost you £2.99 for 75ml.

Review: L'Annine Hand and Body Cream

The recent cold weather we've been having is playing havoc with my hands. They can be dry at the best of times, but the cold snap, combined with my scratching and pulling at dry patches (something I do when stressed) has left them ultra-dry, ragged, and with a strange scaly patch down one finger. So, when a recent MakeupAlley swap turned up with a sample sachet of L'Annine hand and body cream, I ripped it open and gave it a go.

I'd not heard of L'Annine before, and having done some research, it seems that the brand is more widely available in the US. The cream, which comes in a variety of fragrances, claims to promote healing of the skin as well as providing effective moisturisation.

It's a fairly thick, heavy cream, and when I initially started rubbing a good dollop into my hands, I worried that I'd put on far too much, as it went white and completely coated my hands. However, a few more moments of rubbing in, and it was gone - for such a thick cream, it's very quickly absorbed. My hands were left coated, but in a non-sticky, non-offensive way - I was able to use keyboard and mouse immediately without transferring gunk all over them.

After several hours, my hands are definitely softer, and the strange scaly patch of skin on my finger barely feels different to the rest of my hands. Whilst I've washed my hands multiple times since application, my hands still feel moisturised and haven't started looking and feeling dry again.

Overall, I'm very impressed, and very pleased to have discovered this cream - while it's hard to find over here, it is available on eBay and on some US based webstores which will ship internationally. A 2.2oz tube will set you back about $16 - and I think I'll be ordering some soon, as no other cream I've tried this winter has been anywhere near as effective at moisturising my hands.

If you'd like to try it, it's available from BeautyHabit.com and DermStore.com. Not sure about international shipping from BeautyHabit, but Dermstore seem to charge around $20.

Review: Method Almond Flower Hand Wash

Full disclosure: We were sent this product by a PR to review on the LondonBeautyReview. That doesn't mean that the following review is biased; we promise to give the same honest opinions for all products, whether we paid for them ourselves or were given them to try out.

My first thought, when I received this handwash, was that it looks quite cool. Under the cardboard sleeve, the bottle is square, textured, and very chunky. I imagine that if you had a shiny ultra modern bathroom, this'd look right at home in it.

Method describe themselves as "people against dirty", and sell a small range of handwash and baby toiletries alongside a range of household cleaners. Their USP is that they make products which are derived from "plants not chemical plants", and are against animal testing. Their products are free from "parabens, EDTA or antibacterial agents" and their packaging is all recyclable.

Priced at £3.99, this handwash is the moisturising Almond Flower variety. The first time I tried it, I was surprised by how much effort I had to put into getting a lather - unlike conventional handwashes, the Method product doesn't produce masses of foam. I'm guessing that's down to the lack of SLS in the ingredients; the lack of SLS means that straight off, this product won't be quite so drying as other handwashes. The scent is light and pretty; it smells creamy and gently floral, is definitely not overpowering, and doesn't linger once you've dried your hands. And indeed - it cleaned my hands perfectly well, and left them feeling very soft compared to other handwashes I've used in the past.

If you're a green-thinking person, this product might appeal to you with its earth-friendly credentials. For me, I'll happily use the rest of the bottle, and may well repurchase if I happen across it.

If you'd like to learn more, or try it for yourself, you'll find more info and an online shop at Method's website.

REN Grapeseed Jojoba & Shea Butter Body Cream

A recent stay in a posh hotel yielded a few gorgeous REN miniatures - and I've become somewhat addicted to the Grapeseed, Jojoba and Shea Butter Body Cream (possibly the longest product name in the world!). It manages to be a very rich cream which is absorbed quickly, leaving no residue, while hydrating the skin and leaving it smooth and gloriously but subtly scented.

Since I took up swimming, my hands have become more dry than usual, and this cream really helps to get them soft again after a dose of chlorine. While it's a bit overkill for the rest of my body (my skin is not dry at all, and rarely gets a coating of body cream), it works wonders on dry areas such as elbows and feet.

All this, as usual, comes at a price - £17.00 for 200ml (ouch!). At that price, I couldn't contemplate putting it all over my body, even though a little does go a long way. If you'd like to try it yourself, you can get the full size version at HQHair.com.