When the weather is heating up and you don’t want your make up sweating down your face, the answer for me is simple… less coverage and more skin. It’s goodbye to the high coverage formula’s that I usually love and hello to sunkissed skin and freckles. For me, when I want to bare my skin on a day to day basis, a good, scrap that, excellent skin week is a necessity. The change in weather, more exposure to sunlight (provided I’ve slapped on that SPF) and the extra Vitamin D is a huge factor in my skin feeling and looking better, but I owe some of that complexion confidence to a shake up in skincare and some of the  new (and not so new) products making their way into my bathroom.

Botanics All Bright Radiance Balm takes on a similar role as the significantly pricer Beauty Flash Balm from Clarins. Although a runnier formula than its high end counterpart, this Hibiscus enriched cream cream works wonders at helping me achieving a natural radiant glow, whether that be under make up as a primer to create the perfect base or used alone, I tend to apply a pea sized amount of this AFTER my day to day moisturiser to ensure my skin still gets all the hydration it needs with an extra bit of glow.

I used to stay away from oil based products under the illusion that oily/combination skin + oil would surely = an oil slick. Oily skin can often produce more oil as a defence mechanism to balance out the loss of moisture in skin and so using oil-based products, the oil attracts oil and can dissolve sebum, grease or makeup without stripping the skin of its natural oils. Long story short? I’m no longer terrified of oil based products. The Body Shop Cleansing Oil is the perfect example of an oil based cleanser I would avoid like the plague, but since introducing into my cleansing routine I’ve found that my skin loves it. For my skincare routine, the What Skin Needs Hydrating Facial Serum is a light, non-greasy oil based formula that with superior hydrating and skin cell renewal properties. What I really love about this serum aside from how it makes my skin look is that it absorbs so quickly (which shows my skin really does need it I suppose?) and is suitable to apply before bed and in the morning. For me personally, there’s nothing worse than a cream or serum that just sits on my face and leaves it feeling wet or tacky before bed and LUCKILY, this soaks in in the time it takes me to apply my serum, eyecream, have a quick scroll through social media and get off to sleep.  I’ve also been applying it to my heavier and matte foundations to sheer them out a little and make them more comfortable to wear. 

With summer days and nights comes the lure of a beer garden, after work drinks or glasses of wine in the garden.  Combined with the late nights that come with a few gins, removing make up before crashing into bed can be a little bit of a chore and something that can easily be skipped.  The morning after the night before make up, I’m talking smeared eye makeup and patchy foundation can wreak havoc on my skin for days after, especially when combined with the dehydration that alcohol causes to skin.  I tend to be pretty good at the post piss up makeup removal but for the times that I’m not, I’ve been relying on the no cleanser needed, magical Make Up Eraser.  The Make Up Eraser is made from a specially knitted polyester/silk fibre, which creates what is called a hydro-mechanical process that breaks the surface tension of the oils that bond make up to the skin. Make Up Eraser even removes waterproof and smear proof mascara and even the most stubborn of liquid lipsticks.  Buhbye Kylie Lip Kits.

Ive been singing the praises of the B Clean Melting Cleansing Gel since I picked it up last month from Superdrug.  It’s such a gentle gel cleanser that melts down to an oil consistency when applied with the finger tips to the skin and washes off as a milk toner.  This is so quick and easy to remove makeup and leaves my skin feeling super soft without stripping it of any natural oils or drying it out. 

Hydra Genius Aloe Care is one of the most recent skincare releases from L’Oreal and is the one I was most looking forward to trying.  Cited as being similar to the La Roche Posay Hydraphase serum, Hydra Genius boats the enriching qualities of Aloe Water and Hyaluronic Acid to refresh and moisturise skin without overloading it.  This gel like formula absorbs really quickly, bingo (!!) and feels super light on the skin which makes it the perfect day to day moisturiser.