4 spring beauty launches we love

Spring brings buds on trees, daffodils in the parks, and skin-care launches on the shelves of beauty stores.

We perused the natural newcomers, and found four especially fresh-faced options that make us feel renewed and luminous just looking at the labels. (And, during a test-run, they also proved their mettle.)

Here are the spring debuts we’ll be cleansing with, dabbing on, and beautifying with for clear, bright, and healthy-looking skin all season long. And beyond…. Have you tried any new products for spring?

3. TRES PURE

When you have a science background and love beauty products, but go into banking, sometimes your heart calls you back. That was the case with Shahnaz Hussain, the founder of Tres Pure. The pretty (and still ambitious) New Yorker supports cooperatives in Uganda to farms in Tunisia, when sourcing the ethical, clean, and often super-expensive ingredients (we’re not going to lie) that make up her luxe line. (The popular product trio above is $145.) And while Tres Pure is made in New York, it has fans from London to the UAE, and has just started to catch on at home.

The natural products are simple—rice and adzuki bean is used in the scrub, carrot seed in the toner, and a blend of marula, chamomile, and other plant oils hydrate and brighten skin in the face oil (a best-seller). As Hussain says, “The simplicity of quality ingredients is the secret behind beautiful skin. And I think that’s what people really want.”

www.trespure.com

4. W3LL PEOPLE

The performance-based “hippie tested, diva-approved” makeup brand just got a white-hot makeover—both the packaging and what’s inside it.Now the entire handcrafted, natural line contains skin-calming organic aloe, which “adds amazing luminosity, and a creamier, more blendable texture,” explains color director, Shirley Pinkson. You can really see the aloe’s magic in the foundations that absorb excess shine without disappearing your glow. (No mannequin skin!)

Spring brings three new multitasking Universalist Colorsticks ($33) for cheeks and lips (we heart the blood-orange No. 6). And we’re not the only one loving the brand reboot: W3LL PEOPLE will have pride of place in H&M’s new luxe retail stores, called & Other Stories, in London, Paris, Milan, and beyond, reaching scores of healthy beauties across the pond.

www.w3llpeople.com

See the first two picks here!

Priti Nail Polish (Review and Giveaway)—-Closed

A nail polish that gives you that glam look that every pretty girl desires. I am here today with one of the top brand called Priti NYC.

Priti NYC are all completely non-toxic and free of formaldehyde, dibutyl phathalate (DBP), toluene, and camphor, vegan and cruelty free. These luxury polishes contain UV inhibitor, and are fast drying. They go smooth and look very bright and glossy. Here are the 2 colors I got to try:

Flame of the Forest

Lovely coral with shimmer. It gives you the perfect orange color and is perfect for Spring season

Swan River Daisy

A bright navy color

Now the giveaway details: If you want to win Priti polishes then write me an email at rubybeautyorganics@hotmail.com with Priti in the subject line, and include your name, your address and telephone number. A winner will be selected randomly. Send this to me by the end of the day Thursday 7th, 2013.

Note: This contest is only open for my US and Canadian followers.

Sponsored by:

Product Review: Arcona Magic White Ice Lotion and Eye Dew

By Siobhan O’Connor for NoMoreDirtyLooks.com

You know how you know it’s love? You get just a little taste and you want more. You find ways to work the object of your affection into conversations that have nothing (nothing!) to do with the topic at hand. Your thoughts kind of loop.

A few weeks ago, my latest order from NuboNau showed up. The new Ilia mascara, that RMS Un-Powder—and a ton of free samples, as usual. Huh! Arcona, I thought. I’ve never tried Arcona.

What kind of clean-beauty blogger am I that I’ve never tried Arcona? To be honest, I was a little scared of the line. Years ago, someone told me it was very “active,” and my skin doesn’t like “active.” My skin likes “soothing,” “calming,” and “hydrating.” But the little sample of Magic White Ice was calling to me. Also, while I’d never tried it, Arcona’s Eye Dew is easily the most tantalizingly named product under the sun. So I’d had that one on my mind for a minute, too.

About a week earlier, I’d done a TV thing for work* and the makeup artist commented on how dry my skin was. She was nice about it—as nice as a person can be when they are telling you your skin is super-dry under insanely bright lights—but I was kind of embarrassed.

I needed some help, and I was hopeful that this little tube would perform, well, magic on my skin.

After two weeks of twice daily use, the verdict is in: Hydrated, calmed, soothed. Hooray!

And the Eye Dew? It lives up to the name. I feel good about the ingredient lists, filled with botanical anti-agers and moisturizers, with lots of antioxidants. I like that the lotion has tea tree and witch hazel, preventing spots, but doesn’t dry me out. And the Eye Dew. I don’t have any words for the Eye Dew. The name says it all.

When I ran out of the samples, I bought full sizes. And like anything you learn to love, I already have a hard time remembering life (OK, my skin) without it.

Have you ever tried Arcona? Any other skin or eye serums you’re loving?

Keep reading…

Paraben update: New research on beauty’s most problematic preservatives

By Well+Good NYC

“Parabens,” the term for a group of preservatives used in mainstream beauty products, wasn’t always a dirty word.

In 2004, Dr. Philippa Darbre, a research scientist at the University of Reading in the UK, published a small but pioneering study that showed high concentrations of parabens in human breast tumors.

Women everywhere flipped over their moisturizers to read the list of ingredients.

“That first paper shocked people because it was the first time intact parabens had ever been measured in the human body,” says Dr. Darbre. And while the study did not show that the chemicals cause cancer, it sounded a serious alarm.

Why? Parabens, which prevent bacteria from growing in beauty and personal-care products, are able to mimic or interfere with estrogen in the body, and exposure to estrogen is one of the primary influences on the development of breast cancer.

Since then, several studies have detected and reported parabens in human urine and tissue. In response, many beauty companies have eliminated them from ingredient lists, though they’re still used in many mainstream products.

Now, Dr. Darbre has published two new studies that shed even more light on the ways parabens enter our bodies and how they affect our health.

Here’s what you need to know about the latest research (and before refilling your beauty bag):

1. Parabens are getting into your body. In March, Dr. Darbre and her team published the results of a study that replicated the original study done in 2004, with a much larger sample size. They looked at the concentration of five parabens in breast tumor tissue. One or more types were found in 99 percent of the tissue samples, and all five were measurable in 60 percent of the samples. “The take-home message was that we validated the earlier study with a much more substantial study. Parabens are getting into the breast, and they’re getting in in significant amounts,” she explains.

2. Yup, your skin is letting them in. The parabens identified in the study were primarily intact, meaning they’ve bypassed the liver. What does this mean? You’re not getting them from your food, they’re being absorbed through your skin.

Keep reading for more here…

My Five Beauty Obsessions: Jill Platner

By Well+Good NYC

Jill Platner is the healthy, chic New York woman’s go-to jewelry designer.

Platner’s fans, like Elena Brower and Schuyler Grant, love her for her gorgeous exacting metalworking, but also for her healthy approach to maintaining an inner and outer glow. She works out with Madonna’s former trainer and flame Carlos Leon, juices daily, and even recently hosted a Wellness Day at her Soho boutique, all of which leave little time for primping.

“I am very low-key with my hair and beauty rituals,” Platner says. We had her dish on the few products she does work into her beauty routine on a regular basis.

1. Davines Hair Products (Price varies) I love the natural ingredients and the texture they give my hair, especially since I prefer the ease of letting it dry naturally. I get them from my good friend April Barton’s salon, Suite 303 in the Chelsea Hotel.

2. Epicuren Clarify Cleanser ($25) When I work on sculptures, my skin gets coated in metal dust, and this really leaves me clean and soft. I love how nourished my skin feels after using it, and the herbal scent is amazing. I get lots of Epicuren products from my facialist Monique at Haven Spa in Soho.

Keep reading for 3 more here…

Do You Use Products That Contain Silicone?

By Siobhan O’Connor for NoMoreDirtyLooks.com

When I first met Horst Rechelbacher, founder of Aveda and, more recently (thank goodness), Intelligent Nutrients, we spent a lot of time talking about silicone. Silicone, most of you probably know, is widely used in personal care products across the spectrum—from the relatively clean to your standard-issue drugstore brands. It’s especially useful in makeup, primer, sunscreen  and tinted moisturizer because it gives products a slippery sit-on-skin feeling that allows for even spreading, no rubbing, and produces a nice surface on top of which you can go ahead and make your face.

It’s also in a lot on conditioners and leave-ins, because it sits on the shaft of your hair and can take the guesswork (and manual labor) out of smoothing unruly manes, especially when it’s humid out. My experience is that repeated use of silicone on my hair makes it look like complete and utter garbage. My experience with my skin has not been quite the same.

As a refresher, most of the people I have spoken with who swear against it do so for one of a number of reasons. Because it’s occlusive (that means it sits on the surface of the skin and blocks moisture from escaping—but also blocks other things from going in); because it might be comedogenic (the research is equivocal on this one); and because it “doesn’t break down in nature,” says Rechelbacher (and others). On the other hand, dimethicone’s molecule weight makes it impossible, I believe, to migrate past the top layer of your skin—which is where it’s designed to sit, anyway. That’s how it “works.” But our research is ongoing at this point.

I know natural-beady diehards who swear by it and diehards who would, well, die before they used a product that contains it. We were in the latter camp. Now, we’re rethinking our position—but the jury’s still out.

No More Dirty Looks has historically said no to all silicone. It wasn’t on the list of our dirty 20-or-so in the book, mainly because the research we were able to find about its toxicity was unconvincing. At the same time, we can appreciate that many ingredients don’t have nearly enough scientific data published about their safety, and we definitely skew more toward “when in doubt, don’t.”

But then something happened.

Keep reading…

7 best natural mascaras

By Well+Good NYC

Here’s a not-so-secret secret: Even natural beauty divas tend to cheat when it comes to their lashes, coating them in Maybelline Great Lash or lust-worthy DiorShow.

However, that’s beginning to change.

“Every natural makeup line is working on a mascara worth releasing,” says Spirit Demerson, founder of SpiritBeautyLounge.com. “Expect big reveals next year.”

Can’t wait till then? We found seven that added just as much volume, length, and drama as their chemical counterparts. (There’s still no waterproof natural.)

Here are seven great natural mascaras we wouldn’t bat an eye at.

—Melisse Gelula and Lisa Elaine Held

Josie Maran GOGO Natural Volume Argan Mascara

$22, www.josiemarancosmetics.com

We’re saying it: Maran’s argan-oil based mascara works just as well as traditional one. It produces thick, voluminous lashes (and a dewy shine) in just a few strokes with little-to-no clumps.

And it has a heart: For every mascara purchased, a dollar is donated to a women’s cancer charity.

One drawback: It’s otherwise natural, organic formula does contain a couple of suspicious ingredients at the very end of the list.

Korres Provitamin B5 & Rice Bran Mascara

$18, www.korresusa.com

This one is about length over volume. The small, thin spokes on the brush lengthen and separate perfectly, leaving a dark, matte finish.

Its ingredient list is not 100 percent pure, mainly because of the presence of preservative phenoxyethanol, but it’s a million steps up from L’Oreal.

Dr. Hauschka Volume Mascara

$29.95, www.drhauschka.com

It goes on as elegantly as a traditional mascara, so you wouldn’t know you were applying super natural ingredients, like silk powder and botanical waxes.

The mascara has a rosy, not chemical scent, which comes from essential oil fragrance (not the chemical kind).

Only downside is the smudge-proof claim didn’t hold true for me after just a couple hours.

Keep reading for 4 more here…

Tammy Fender’s skin-care line contains an ingredient so secret it’s not even on the label

By Well+Good NYC

Lots of beauty products tout a secret ingredient. (Whether the Nightingale droppings of the ’90s or the apple stem cells of the moment.) And in that respect facialist Tammy Fender’s range is no different.

What’s the magic in her holistic skin-care line? Divine consciousness.

The West Palm Beach practitioner’s line is finally making its New York City debut at ABC Home’s Apothecary. Fender’s might be the first range of botanical cleansers, toners, treatment serums, peels, and body oils aimed squarely at improving your soul. The jury’s still out on whether cynical New Yorkers will embrace her ray of bioenergetic sunshine.

Call it the power of positive intention (or a bottled version of The Secret), Fender infuses her products with her sweet, personable spirit (I mean, look at the photo of this woman—you’d never know she tended Donald Trump’s skin) and adds “life force” of plants. No hair of newt needed.

For Fender, an ingredient purist and polymath of botany, aromatherapy, and chemistry, the concept of “pure living energy” comes from working with whole organic plants, pure herbal infusions, and therapeutic grade essential oils instead of chemicals.

It’s these “active, highly vibrational ingredients” that she says can be “immediately absorbed and permeate on a cellular level to enhance the way the skin functions, resulting in vibrant healthy skin.” It’s a philosophy the facialist shares in part with biodynamic skin-care brands, like Dr. Hauschka and Jurlique.

But while these brands focus on the farming practices, the emphasis for Fender’s small-batch line is the healing intention of the formulator. (Her mantra: don’t think about war or the economy when mixing ingredients.)

Keep reading…

Why a good moisturizer isn’t enough for great skin

By Well+Good NYC

Moisturizers get all the marquee billing, especially come fall when back-to-beauty ads punctuate every repeat episode of the Real Housewives of New Jersey. But if you’re not using a good exfoliant, you’re throwing your money away—and missing a key skin-rejuvenating opportunity. Just ask any NYC facialist, who would almost never skip the skin-sloughing step during a spa treatment. Why?

A good scrub can whisk away visible blackheads and help keep pores open and clean. Great example: Christine Chin Resurface Exfoliating Scrub ($28, http://www.christinechin.com), which uses micro-aluminum particles to scrub away dead skin, leaving a blackhead-free T-zone and a much-desired baby-bottom softness. Chin’s facials are probably the city’s fiercest.

A chemical exfoliant (or peel) dissolves dead skin cells as a way to remedy dryness, uneven skin tone, and a rough texture—in the time it takes to wash your face. Great example: Susan Ciminelli Algae Deep Cleanse ($65, http://www.susanciminelli.com), laced with a sinus-clearing scent of peppermint and papaya enzymes that brighten skin tone almost immediately. It’s also great for red, bumpy acne, as opposed to scrubs that can inflame it. Ask Cimminelli, whose chakra-balancing facials are meant to calm your mind and your skin.

Keep reading…

Dark circles? Natural concealers that work and how to use them

By Well+Good NYC

Yves St. Laurent Touche Eclat has been touted as a magic wand for dark under-eye circles. But its not-at-all-natural formulation disqualifies it for natural types. So what’s the solution for those of us whose windows to the soul are showing the pains of sleepless nights and possibly a genetic predisposition to dark circles?

First, acceptance of reality, says Brooklyn natural makeup artist Jessa Blades. “We think it’s possible not to have under-eye circles. But often they’re a shadow from your brow bone. You might want to be a little open to the fact dark circles are not going to go away completely.” (Even if you watch your salt intake and sleep.)

Natural makeup artist Jessa Blades

The second challenge: Finding a natural concealer that covers enough—or covers without looking cakey. And third, we just don’t know how to use concealers properly, says Blades, who’s witnessed many a cake-icing technique on that thin under-eye skin.

So how can you effectively cover dark circles? Read on for seven mind-blowing tips from Blades—and our top picks for natural products that work:

1. Hydrate the eye area
Is your finger or brush dragging on dry skin? The skin around the eyes is thinner and has fewer oil glands than the rest of the face. So you may need to hydrate the area first with something creamy first, then smooth on your concealer.
Solution: Weleda Pomegranate Firming Eye Cream, $33, www.usa.weleda.com, or Organic Pharmacy Honey & Jasmine Mask, $65.95, www.theorganicpharmacy.com

2. If concealer is too drying, use a creamy foundation
Often concealer is too thick or cakey like corrective makeup. So use a creamy foundation that feels more like a second skin, and yet provides some coverage, says Blades. You should love the way it lies on the skin.
Solution: NVEY ECO Organic Cream Deluxe Foundation, $43–$60, www.econveybeauty.com

RMS Beauty Un-Cover Up

3. Use concealer under a tinted moisturizer
This creates a barely-there makeup look that conceals a few flaws then illuminates your skin, if your tinted moisturizer uses mica, a mineral with light-reflecting properties.
Solution: RMS Beauty Un-Cover Up, $36, www.spiritbeautylounge.com or Lavera Natural Concealer, $19, www.lavera.com

Keep reading for 4 more here…