Tuesday 31 March 2015

Mungo Murphy's Nourishing Seaweed Mask


I have had this little jar of facemask in my stash for a few months and not gotten around to reviewing it. Nourishing Seaweed Mask was part of January's SoukSouk box. Discovering that niche brand, that little gem of a product is the whole attraction of a beauty box subscription. Mungo Murphy is a man who loves seaweed, whether that be eating it or making products with it. You can read his story here. I have to say it really made me smile and I am intrigued by some of the recipes.

Anyway, onto the actual mask. The ingredient list couldn't be simpler. Just one ingredient, ascophyllum nodosum - seaweed. It is rich in vitamins (especially B vitamins), minerals and amino acids, and cleanses, detoxifies and balances the skin. Pretty impressive claims for just one ingredient.

The mask is a fairly fine powder, and has a greeny/brown colour. The instructions say to mix a teaspoon of mask with a little water, oil, yoghurt or honey. When I tried mixing it with water, there was nothing to bind it with. I did try it with water to begin with, but it was difficult to get it to stay put on my skin. For that reason I would suggest using honey or yoghurt.

Being a seaweed product, this does smell strongly of seaweed. Again mixing it with honey or yoghurt does dampen down the smell a little. Having said that, if you have a delicate nose, this may not be the product for you. Once I got past the smell I was really surprised at just how good a mask this actually is. Firstly it is very gentle. Even when I made it up with water, it didn't completely dry up on my skin, meaning their was absolutely no tight skin afterwards. I skin looked and felt like it had had a really thorough deep clean, but without the dryness I would usually associate with it. I would say that the results are comparable to that of a good AHA peel mask. Although it may not smell quite as appealing, this offers a really good alternative.

8 comments:

  1. Very interesting Karen...I have never used a mask with similar ingredient before....x sounds a good one!

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  2. This appealed to me when I saw it in the Souk Souk box, sounds really interesting!

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  3. It's just completely different to anything I have in my stash x

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  4. This sounds great! Taking everything back to basics. I have heard that seaweed is very good for skin, but I've never tried it. I don't have too delicate a nose (apart from when I can detect the smell of sick, which makes me... yeah, I won't go into that!), so I'm sure using this wouldn't pose a problem. I guess you could use it in place of a clay mask for detoxifying the skin? I nearly always find clay masks too drying, so this sounds like an ideal alternative. Great review. Tx

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  5. Except for the smell, it sounds great :) xx

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  6. I'm looking forward to trying mine thanks for the mixing tips! x

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  7. This sounds really nice, and only one ingredient!

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