Picture this: you’re crashing at a friends’ place for a couple of days and are in the shower (I swear I was NOT snooping around) when you happen to see a damp beauty blender. And I’m not talking about a freshly-used damp blender... I’m talking about a damp-with-strange-fungal-growth beauty blender.
What do you do?
Throw it in the trash? Cry yourself a river? Set yourself/the apartment on fire?
And no, this is not to say that her apartment smelt like an Israeli disco...because apart from the make-up brushes which looked like they had never been washed, and jaded blenders that housed intergalactic species — the rest of the apartment was fairly clean. Not Call-Me-Martha-Stewart-Cause-Mom-Is-Visiting-Clean, but definitely more than College-Student-Barely-Getting-By-Clean.
Which is what’s surprising. Since I’m all about that #science and #research, I came to the finding that it is astonishingly rare people wash their make-up tools. The more phobic ones just replace a blender each week (not wasteful at all, well done!) while the others live life with fungus and without a care. Eugh, come shudder with me.
I keep three in rotation and just go back and forth, and another one for backup in case I happen to drop it halfway through — which happens more often than I’d like to admit. It’s also very difficult to convince yourself to do this everyday, so the job is best outsourced to an unwitting sibling or parent.
One of the quickest and easiest ways to clean your blenders is to simply pop it in a dish with baby shampoo and warm water. Rinse it till the water runs clear; which won’t take too long if you do it regularly.
Heat sterilisation is also one of the most important things you can do for yourself. Do it once a month; any more and the texture of the blender could change entirely. Any less, and you could end up with uncharacteristic acne breakouts and a nasty smelling sponge. The only real thing a heat cleanse does is kill bacteria; not remove make-up or stains — so this means you’ll still have to do a basic cleanse after.
I’m a fan of the white version of the blender which feel like the softest and I like to think it has the least amount of chemical dyes. The dye is a problem because the colour runs off forever and sometimes even sweeps into your product and it just gets...weird. Silicon blenders are the easiest to clean and use, but I’ve always ended with a flaky finish.
This has grossed me out almost as much as the loofahs which don’t come in boxes. No thank you, I do not wish to take a bath using a giant germ petri dish. To end this on a happy note, I also stopped myself from framing 15 other equally stupid sentences today so you’re all welcome.
Saumya R Chawla
@pixie.secrets
The writer loves to over-share, drink wine & watch period dramas