5 Face Masks to Get Your Skin Through the Rest of Winter

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circulation, complexion, cuticles, decleor, Decleor Neroli Bigarade Oil Mask, deep, delicate, dry hands, dryness, Elemis, Elemis Exotic Cream Moisturising Mask, elemis exotic cream moisturising mask mimosa, Elemis Exotic Frangipani Monoi Hair and Scalp Mask, Elemis Fruit Active Rejuvenating Mask, Elemis Pro-Collagen Hydra-Gel Eye Masks, extract, eye, fruit, gel, hair, heating, hyaluronic acid, intensive, January, kiwi, mask, masks, orange, overnight, plumped, revitalising, revive, say rocket, scalp, sensitive, skin, smoother, smoothing, strawberry, synthesis, wild pansy

Photo by Chris Knight on Unsplash

We all know that January can be a gruelling time for you skin. It’s often the coldest month of the year which means that every time we go outside our is dealing with the elements – then we go back indoors and are faced with central heating, which is a bad combination for our skin. Combine this with shorter days and a tendency to want to hibernate, hardly anyone can ever say that their skin is at its best in January. Masks are a fantastic product for reviving the skin at this time of year and regular usage of a targeted mask can help to ensure that by the time spring comes around and the sun starts to peek through the clouds, your complexion will have a rosy glow that is rarely seen at the end of winter. Here are 5 of our best masks for nourishing the skin, to give you a great start to 2020.

Elemis Exotic Cream Moisturising Mask

This mask from Elemis is made from exotic ingredients and works as a hydrating and soothing treatment. It takes the purest part of the therapeutic plant extracts from mimosa, sea rocket, orange and bergamot leaves, enriching the skin and evening out skin tone. It can be left on overnight as a more intensive treatment and can even be used on dry hands and cuticles if they are suffering the same dryness as your face.

Decleor Neroli Bigarade Oil Mask

This mask from Decleor melts into a fine oil as you massage into the skin, allowing more of the active ingredients to be absorbed into your complexion. It contains extracts of wild pansy which encourages hyaluronic acid synthesis, giving you a plumped, smoother and more youthful complexion in just 10 minutes of use.

Elemis Exotic Frangipani Monoi Hair and Scalp Mask

It’s easy to forget about your scalp as it’s hidden beneath your hair, but many, many people suffer with dryness on their scalp as well as their hair, which is why Elemis invented this mask. It’s a 3-in-1 treatment that deep cleanses the scalp and hair, and can be used either in the shower or as an intensive overnight mask to revive the area. It removes build up and restores healthy looking shine while revitalising the scalp and hair

Elemis Fruit Active Rejuvenating Mask

If your skin is looking dull and tired, this rejuvenating mask from Elemis contains fruit extracts of strawberry and kiwi in a kaolin clay base, which will revive a sallow complexion. Apply to clean skin and leave on for 10 minutes, and your skin will look brighter and more radiant. It’s great for using while laying in the bath and Elemis tells us that it’s also great for smokers as it helps to enhance the circulation in your facial complexion.

Elemis Pro-Collagen Hydra-Gel Eye Masks

Darkness around the eyes is also a really common thing at this time of year, although many face masks aren’t suitable for use around the eyes. That’s why Elemis developed these eye masks which are formulated to instantly reduce the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles around the eyes, giving the delicate area a deep wash of moisture which will get rid of dark circles and tighten the skin. Each individual mask contains potent plankton extract, leaving the skin around the eyes intensity moisturised and instantly hydrated.

What Happens to your Body when You Give up Meat for Veganuary?

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animal, animal products, antioxidants, complexion, dairy, Dermalogica Redness Relief Essence, diet, Elemis Superfood Facial Wash, essential fats, fruit, inflammation, insulin, iron, meat, meat free, multivitamin, no meat, plant-based, skin, type 2 diabetes, Vegan, veganism, Veganuary, vegetables, Vitamin B12, weight gain

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Even if you’re a lifelong meat-eater, you’ve probably heard of Veganuary. The movement started in 2014, and encourages people to give up all animal products and go vegan for the month of January. It’s estimated that half a million people take part, worldwide, and “in January 2019, 500 companies promoted Veganuary and veganism, while more than 200 plant-based products and menus were launched”. With this in mind, we thought we’d take a look at the knock-on effects that giving up meat can have on your body, to give you the inspiration you need to go vegan, even if it’s just for a month:

Inflammation will be Reduced

If you eat cheese, red meat and other processed animal products, there’s a good chance that you’ll have more inflammation in your body than someone who doesn’t. If you suffer from redness and inflamed skin issues, there’s a good chance that your diet is making it worse. As well as giving up animal products, using Dermalogica Redness Relief Essence will help.

You’ll Make Your Gut Happier

There’s a lot of current wisdom which points to the fact that our microbiome, the balance of bacteria in our gut, is what controls how the rest of our body functions. Going vegan can give your microbiome a complete makeover, while using Elemis Superfood Facial Wash will help balance the skin’s own precious microbiome.

Cut Your Risk of Type 2 Diabetes

Many people still think that diabetes is caused by eating sugar, but that’s simply not the case. Animal fat and nitrate preservatives in meat have been found to damage pancreatic cells, worsen inflammation, cause weight gain, and impair the way our insulin functions. By giving up animal products, you dramatically reduce your risk of developing type 2 diabetes.

Your Skin Could Improve

When you cut meat and other animal products out of your diet, you tend to eat more fruit and veg, nuts, and other things which contain essential fats and antioxidants, which are all great for your skin. Supporting this with a proper skincare routine means that, by February, your skin could look better than ever.

You Might Need to Supplement

The one downside of giving up animal products is that you might lose certain nutrients from your diet. It is possible to get everything you need from a plant-based diet but this often takes a bit of time and some trial and error. Adding a multivitamin into your diet, and ensuring you’re getting enough iron and vitamin B12 will help you to stay feeling great without animal products.

Stress isn’t just for National Stress Awareness Day

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24/7, a sense of dread, angry customer, Be mindful, busy, buzz word, chocolate, coffee, control, coping, cross, cry, cutting down takeaways, diary, drinking and binge-eating, drinking lots of water, eating a nutritious diet, emails, energy, exercise, family, feelings and sensations, friends, fruit, Giving up cigarettes, GP, gym, healthy mental wellbeing, heart rate, help, here and now, Ill, impacting your life, impatient, irritable, jump up, Kick the bad stuff, kids, knots in your stomach, laptop, Let it go, lid, lifestyle, loss of libido, manage stress, mindfulness, National Stress Awareness Day, nervous. depressed, out of control, Panic attacks, pattern emerges, phone, physical, Pick your battles, pretty stressful place, pub, react, reflect, resolve, run, settle down, shout out loud, skin, sleepless nights, smoking, social media, Stamp your feet, stress, stressful, swap, swim, Switch off, tackle it, thoughts, thrive, toddler tantrums, toxic habits, triggers, unfair boss, veg, work, work late, world, yell

While the first Wednesday in November each year is National Stress Awareness Day, the world is a pretty stressful place a lot of the time and it is different for us all.

You might feel irritable and impatient, nervous or depressed. There can be knots in your stomach, a sense of dread and the inability to see the good in life. Panic attacks, sleepless nights, loss of libido and feeling sick, dizzy or fainting are all ways stress can be experienced.

If we are to thrive, we need to find our own ways of coping with whatever our busy lives throw at us, so we have some ideas we hope might help.

Know your triggers
A buzz word, maybe, but it’s really good to try to access your triggers, where possible. Stress can come from many things, be that work, kids, family, friends or other people on social media! If you can identify what causes your stress, this will help you to tackle it and get things under control. Start to keep a diary of when you feel stressed, look at who or what sets it off and if a pattern emerges look at the changes you can make so things settle down.

Look at your lifestyle
Exercise is often on the bottom of our to do list, but it is a great way to manage stress. Increasing your heart rate, eating a nutritious diet, drinking lots of water and getting plenty of sleep are really important if you want to keep stress levels down. Just as you track your stress, look at how good you feel after a run or a swim, and how your skin improves when you swap chocolate and coffee for fruit and veg.

Pick your battles
There can be many things in life that are stressful – from a big bill, unfair boss to an angry customer, but if you react to them all you are going to be ill. Choose which things you are going to actually direct energy at and try to resolve, but the rest can be put behind you because they aren’t worth it.

Let it go
Stamp your feet, shout out loud, cry or jump up and down or do some boxing! No, we aren’t talking about toddler tantrums, but letting out your stress and steam in a more physical way. If you are feeling cross and out of control, it might just help to yell about it and get that stress out of your system.

Switch off
Turning off your phone, not checking your emails and powering down your laptop can all help put a lid on stress. You don’t need to be ‘on it’ 24/7, and no one expects you to work late every night, and if they do, maybe you need to look at how much work is impacting your life and stress levels.

Be mindful
This is talked about a lot, but mindfulness is where you have an awareness of the present moment and you pay attention to thoughts, feelings and sensations in the here and now. Mindfulness is really good for healthy mental wellbeing, so if you feel stressed, take a moment and reflect. If your mind gets busy, mindfulness can help to slow it down.

Kick the bad stuff
Smoking, drinking and binge-eating are ways many people cope with stress, but none of those toxic habits will do you any favours. Giving up cigarettes, cutting down takeaways and going to the gym rather than the pub will help you to feel better in the long run.

If things are getting out of hand, chat to your GP – you won’t be the only one.

Team Pure Beauty

Let grapes nourish your skin

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3-in-1 cleanser, antioxidants, balance, beard, beautiful, Brazilian purple clay, Chamomile Extract, champagne, clarity, cleansed, Coneflower, dark spots, dead skin cells, Decleor Hydra-Radiance Cleansing Mousse, defende, dehydrate, Dermalogica Intensive Eye Repair, Dermalogica Intensive Moisture Balance Classic Formula, Elemis Smooth Result Shave and Beard Oil, Elemis Superfood Berry Boost Mask, exfoliate, eye areas, eye treatment, facial hair, fine dehydration lines, free radicals, fruit, glowing, grape juice, grapes, green tea, healthy looking skin, impurities, Jan Marini Age Intenrention Gentle Cleanse, Japanese white mulberry., mild, non-irritating formula, nourishing and moisturising properties, Papaya Extract, pat, Prosecco, Rescue, samples, shave, skin protect, smoothie-inspired, t-zone, toned skin, unique, vegan friendly, Vitamin C, vitamin-rich herbal oils, Vitamins C and E, white grape seed oil, wine, wrinkles

Say grapes and many of us think of wine, prosecco and champagne, but while these all dehydrate our skin, this simple fruit can actually come to the rescue of it.

Jam packed with Vitamin C and antioxidants, grapes can help to revitalise your skin and protect it from nature and the free radicals that can cause wrinkles and dark spots.

Let’s look at some of the great grape products we sell so you can get involved with some fruity goodness.

Decleor Hydra-Radiance Cleansing Mousse is great for those of you with a busy life, as this 3-in-1 cleanser leaves you with beautiful, glowing, healthy-looking skin. Grape juice, papaya extract and Japanese white mulberry come together to exfoliate and gently take away dead skin cells and leave behind clarity and luminosity after the very first use.

We love the Elemis Superfood Berry Boost Mask which contains a unique complex of ingredients that balance the skin and mattify the T-Zone. The smoothie-inspired, vegan friendly mask comes with Brazilian purple clay which helps to draw out skin impurities and gently exfoliates at the same time. Grape seed oil comes with excellent nourishing and moisturising properties and that’s why they are in this berry-tastic mask which will leave your skin soft and smooth.

Antioxidant Vitamins C and E, grape seed extract, ginkgo biloba and green tea help defend the skin against free radicals and they’re all found in the Dermalogica Intensive Eye Repair cream. This rich eye treatment helps repair prematurely-ageing skin by smoothing fine dehydration lines. Gently pat a little cream around the eye area, blending inward from the outer corner and watch the years slip away.

The moisturising benefits of grape seed oil come into play once again with the Elemis Smooth Result Shave and Beard Oil. This cool, multi-purpose oil softens facial hair and prepares skin for a smooth, close shave. Packed with vitamin-rich herbal oils this is great for all skin types and is the ideal pre-shave fix.

For something special when it comes to your beauty regime, how about trying the Jan Marini Age Intenrention Gentle Cleanser? This mild, non-irritating formula is ideal for sensitive skin and can even be used around the eyes. Green tea, grape seed and chamomile extract have been expertly blended to create something really fantastic and it’s bursting with natural goodness that your skin will soak up.

The Dermalogica Intensive Moisture Balance Classic Formula combats dry skin and thanks to vitamin C it also helps smooth the appearance of fine lines and skin damage. Superoxide dismutase, vitamins A and E, and ginkgo protect against the environment. Soothing coneflower and extracts of grape seed reduce the signs of ageing and leave skin smooth and firmer-looking. This can be used morning and night and it’s best to apply to cleansed, toned skin using light, upward strokes.

For more information, get in touch so we can help you get the best from your beauty products and we will even send samples if that helps you make the right decision.

Team Pure Beauty

Are the foods you think are healthy really doing the job?

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agave, antioxidant, avocado, best, boiled, canning, cereal bar, cereal bars, coconut oil, dark chocolate, drink, eat, eating, eggs, energy, essential vitamins and minerals, experts, extra sugars, fibre, fight disease, food, freezing, fresh, fresh food, fruit, fruit juice, good health, Granola, healthy choice, healthy fat, heart health, honey, hungover, hydrate, immune systems, information overload, juiced, kitchen, label, lethargic, lower blood pressure, maple syrup, milk chocolate, mineral, myths, nutritious breakfast, olive, poached, preserves, rapeseed and sunflower oils, Red wine, rye toast, saturated fat, scrambled, smoothies, syrup, teeth, unsaturated, vitamin, waistline, weight loss, yogurt

It seems that every week the experts are telling us what to eat and drink to ensure we are in good health and living our best lives. The problem is, we can get information overload which means we don’t know what to do for the best, and often end up simply eating whatever we fancy.

We’ve had a look at some of the myths out there and hope it will help you work out what is good for you and what isn’t quite up there in the healthy stakes.

Granola makes a nutritious breakfast
Many of us think that granola and cereal bars are a healthy breakfast choice but this isn’t always the case. Yes, you can add granola to fruit and yoghurt, but these cereals often have extra added sugars, so it’s a good idea to check the label before you buy a new box. Grabbing a cereal bar on the go is easy, but do you really know what you are eating and how good for you it really is? One of the best things you can have for breakfast are eggs – be that boiled, poached or scrambled and having rye toast and avocado, will make things even better.

To juice or not to juice?
Fruit juice is considered to be a healthy way to increase your vitamin levels and clock up that all important five a day quota the world over. The reality is that the antioxidant, fibre, mineral and vitamin content of whole fruits are drastically cut when they are juiced. It’s so much better for you to eat fruits rather than to drink them, instead hydrate with water and have juice and smoothies now and again as a treat.

What’s the deal with honey?
Honey might be natural but sugar is sugar and nutrition-wise, agave, honey and maple syrup are no better than the bog-standard white stuff. You can eat it and enjoy it, but don’t over do it because your teeth and waistline won’t thank you.

Is coconut oil a healthy fat?
Unless you have been hibernating, you will probably be aware that coconut oil has been hailed as a ‘healthy choice’ in the kitchen. Yes, it has good points, but coconut oil is still high in saturated fat and it’s the unsaturated varieties that will do more for you in terms of health. Olive, rapeseed and sunflower oils all help to support heart health and they provide us with energy, while strengthening our immune systems too.

Red wine boosts health
Many of us do think that red wine is good for us because of the antioxidants that help fight disease. Yes, there is an element of truth here, but it still contains sugar and can make you feel lethargic and hungover, so don’t knock it back to excess because that will undo any good you have done!

Dark chocolate vs milk chocolate
How many times have you read that eating dark chocolate is good for you??? Well, it might help lower blood pressure but it won’t help with any weight loss as it is still pretty calorific. A little bit of what you fancy is true, but munching a family bar thinking your heart will benefit, might not be quite right so stick to a couple of squares.

Only fresh foods are good for you
We aren’t sure where this comes from, but you can eat frozen and tinned fruit and vegetables and still get the same nutritious benefits you will find in the fresh alternatives, sometimes even more. This is the case because the process of canning and freezing preserves most nutrients and antioxidants, so when you eat them they are still packed with essential vitamins and minerals. One thing to watch out for is tinned fruit that comes in sugary syrup, go for natural juice every time and if you rinse before you eat, even better.

Team Pure Beauty