SkinFood Mask Reviews (cont.)

I still have more mask samples from that initial purchase at the San Francisco Stonestown SkinFood store! I love how SkinFood focuses its products around common Asian ingredients. As an Asian American, it's hard for me to find relatable Asian beauty products without having to search online. Yet SkinFood conveniently has locations on the West Coast, carrying products involving Asian ingredients such as ginseng (in my last review), rice and even black sesame! I couldn't contain my enjoyment as I saw the interesting samples.

Rice Mask
SkinFood's Rice Mask is supposed to be nutritious to soften, moisturize and brighten skin.  I hope this mask will live up to its words, because those are dashing qualities I'd love to have during this chilly winter.

The instructions on the back of this sample says to massage the product over a dry face, and then rinse off.  SkinFood's website more specifically says to apply the mask onto your face, leave it on for 10 to 15 minutes, and then wash off with warm water.

Please excuse my super red hands-they were soaking in super hot water for half an hour!  The consistency of this opaque white mask is very smooth and creamy and contains clear micro crystals, I suppose rice extract?  This mask has a mild cleanliness soap scent to it, which isn't bad, but isn't to my taste either.

The Pros

•  My face is refreshed, and looks and feels clean right after rinsing off the mask
• The smoothness of this mask makes it very easy to spread across my face, like melted butter
• The crystals are gentle on the skin yet they still work well to massage and exfoliate my face

The Cons

• The smell can improve, but because it's so mild, it's not that noticeable

Overall, I really like this mask!  I took a super hot bath right before putting this on, so putting this mask on was really cooling and refreshing (I wonder if I would have felt the same way if I hadn't taken the bath though).  I like how this creamy consistency feels like a lotion that moisturizes and like a scrub that exfoliates.  This silky smoothness is the best quality about this mask, which I assume is great for sensitive skin because it doesn't cause any stinging sensation.

Black Sesame Hot Mask
According to the back label, the mix of salt, sugar powder and heat opens the pores and cleans the gunk inside while the black sesame leaves skin feeling silky.  I'm not sure how this product is supposed to be warm, as there is no instruction to heat the product or store it in a hot place.  It's interesting, here I'm worrying that this product will not be hot, yet SkinFood's website is worried that this product will overheat.  Here, it says that this mask should be used with moderate temperature.  It can overheat if it is used in hot areas, like a bathroom or sauna apparently.

 

The directions say to apply and massage the mask in a circular motion onto a moist face, leave on for three to five minutes, and then rinse off with warm water.  

The left photos show the super thick, almost coagulated consistency. The mask is very stiff, so I had to really force the mask to spread across my face with my fingers. Now I know why they suggest moistening your face first: it gives a slippery texture for the mask to more easily spread.  The right photo shows the mask on my face. You can see it is translucent with a murky gray hue, and mixed in are crushed black sesame (the black dots are not my beauty marks). Also the smell is a subtle black sesame scent, but it's not as pleasant as the Chinese black sesame pudding (Ji Ma Woo in Canto).

The Pros

• My face feels and looks clean right after rinsing off the mask

The Cons

• The mask itself is very stiff and gooey, so it sticks to itself, making it hard to spread across my face
• The black sesame seeds are rough on my skin when washing the mask off
• It is hard to remove all the black specks when rinsing.  When I used my toner a few hours later, I had so much extract that was still left on my face.
• The mask is room temperature, not hot as implied by its name.

I have really mixed feelings for this mask. While putting it on and letting the product seep into my skin, I didn't like it. But now that I review my notes, I don't actually see anything completely bad about this. In the end, my face feels and looks clean. I would say just don't expect much when using this product (I'm referring to the 'hot pack' element of this mask), and you can be content with this mask.

Bare with me, I have one more SkinFood mask sample which I'll review in an upcoming post!