Clockface Beauty – Beard Oil Ho Leaf & Bergamot

They say ‘time is measured in days, weeks and beards’ and with this yo-yo-ing lockdown, it feels like I’ve been cultivating one for months! Yet again, this presents another perfect opportunity to put those girls at The Amazing Blog through their paces, to search out a natural, super-gentle and great smelling beard oil for me. Not an easy task as my skin is quite sensitive and when washing my face, which is now quite often, it becomes a little sore and sensitive. This time, they introduced me to one of their favourite organic skincare brands Clockface Beauty who has created a fantastic grooming range from cleanser, masks to shave balms and oils. They kindly sent us their award-winning Ho Leaf & Bergamot Beard Oil which I couldn’t wait to try. If the brand sounds familiar to you, it probably because you’ve read our feature on their Foot & Leg Scrub and Balm here.

Sarah Thomas founded Clockface Beauty with the help of her mother, Karen. During her pregnancy, Sarah found there to be a noticeable lack of transparency on beauty product labelling. So this is where the Clockface Beauty story began where she and her mother decided to create their brand of natural, organic, cruelty-free and vegan skincare. This luxurious and natural skincare also offers products without artificial chemicals or synthetic fragrances.

As with so many of their products, the Ho Leaf & Bergamot Beard Oil has ingredients that are 99% organic. I used this Beard Oil first thing on my freshly washed beard, massaging it in to help nurture not only my hair follicles but skin too. The result was that my whiskers felt softer and my skin soothed and hydrated. A few drops of this Beard Oil go a long way, it absorbed quickly leaving me with a very pleasant fresh and subtle aroma. Light in consistency, it’s versatile enough to use on all beard lengths and skin types. The key ingredients of bergamot have antibacterial benefits helping to reduce skin irritation, oiliness, acne, psoriasis and eczema. Whereas the frankincense here has anti-ageing properties that protect the skin cells while reducing the blemishes and shrinking the pores. The carrier oils are jojoba which stimulates the hair growth and apricot kernel gives a toning and slight tightening effect to the skin. I was also pleasantly surprised to learn that the ho leaf here is mildly antiseptic, stimulating and known to also be an aphrodisiac! All in all, this Beard Oil feels cooling and healing, so if you too have a newly acquired beard that is giving you some grief, look no further. To purchase the 30ml Clockface Beard Oil for £22 here.

Pure Anada - Delicate Compact Palette & Sweet Stillness Nail Polish

At The Amazing Blog, we think there is nothing better than having a new selection of make-up to experiment with to cheer us all up! Particularly, when it has a range of beautifully subtle daytime shades of blush and eye colours. We’re talking about Pure Anada and today we’ve bringing you another of our #amazingfinds with the Delicate Compact Palette and their softest pink Sweet Stillness Nail Polish. 

If you want to know why we’ve chosen to review Pure Anada a Canadian beauty brand, then see our other feature here. Let’s do a quick recap of their inspiring story behind this brand. Growing up in a eco-household, Candace Grenier, founder of Pure Anada, already had a vast knowledge of what proper nutrition should be and the importance of what the body needs. Passionate about making things for herself, she decided in 2003 to make her home and environmental as holistic as possible, discarding anything chemical. She went on to create a line of ‘natural, safer alternatives to mainstream cosmetics’ homecare, skincare and make-up which is where this success story began. These products are ethical, i.e. no discrimination or child labour is ever involved in the processing of making her raw materials. With clean formulations free from common allergens and ingredients that are naturally sourced, and everything is made in their certified organic labs in Manitoba. Their products are also cruelty-free, mainly vegan and certified with the Leaping Bunny programme. We found these at their UK retailer Live in The Light, so it’s a big thank you to them for sending us these products for review. We’re big fans of this online retailer and recommend a visit to their website as they also share our ethos in promoting holistic and environmentally friendly brands.  

Today we want to talk about Pure Anada’s Delicate Compact Palette and Sweet Stillness Nail Polish.  First things first, the Delicate Compact Palette’s colours are discreet, natural and gave us an effortless no make-up look. The pale rosy pink blush named Sweet Pea pairs perfectly with four eye-shadow colours: The satin luxurious taupe/grey that shifts to a shimmering pink called Haunt, a velvet taupe/mauve titled Macchiato, an iridescent champagne blush named Darling, and finally a matte ballet slipper pink Water Lily. If these moreish colours don’t swipe you off of your feet, then perhaps their win with the Sweet Pea blush at The 2020 Beauty Bible Awards here will. The packaging is recyclable with a pretty floral designed outer box and metallic foil etched cardboard inner palette, that also comes with a mirror inside. It only contains all-natural formulas comprised of pressed mineral pigments and jojoba oil for softness. The jojoba oil keeps the texture silky and smooth and most importantly, non-greasy.  Apart from the colours and natural formulas what we particularly like about this make-up is its cost-effectiveness. Unlike most palettes, this one is refillable! When finished, you can buy the individual colours and pop them right back into each of the magnetic slots in palette. Best of all,  the coverage is sheer but buildable and the blusher promises a demi-matte fresh healthy glow to the face and that’s exactly what it delivered. This is for us a smart investment with its natural everyday colours and is available for £29.95, you can find it here.  

Moving on to the Sweet Stillness Nail Polish which is from a range of twenty long-lasting colours. This Sweet Stillness is a pale rose pink non-toxic nail polish. More importantly, it is free of the five most toxic ingredients which are usually found in regular nail polish. The three most toxic ingredients being dibutyl phthalate, formaldehyde, and toluene. They are followed by another two which are formaldehyde resin and camphor.  If you wish to know how toxic they are, here’s a quick explanation:  The dibutyl phthalate, or otherwise called the plasticizer, is used to provide sheen. It has a carcinogen effect and can cause thyroid problems and is often linked to hormone changes. Formaldehyde used to harden the nails, is also carcinogen when inhaled and while it’s evaporating can sometimes cause allergic reactions if it comes in contact with your skin. The toluene used to give a smooth finish and keep a uniform colour can cause eyes, lung, and throat irritation when inhaled and can also affect the central nervous system. The formaldehyde resin used to strengthen the nails is a skin allergen and remains active for up to three days after your nail polish dries, and can cause dermatitis. Finally, camphor, which used to be a treatment for cold or flu, is now chemically manufactured and can have a serious side effect when ingested. When exposed in large doses, primarily through inhalation, it’s known to cause irritation, nausea, dizziness, and headaches, it is therefore highly toxic! Quickly added the formulas in the Sweet Stillness Nail Polish are solvent-based and not water-based, but this is long-lasting and a more durable option than water-based.  We’d also advise applying it with their Super Base Coat and the Free Topcoat. You can find Pure Anada’s Sweet Stillness Nail Polish here for £8.95. 

Vedic Essentials: GoodNight Food Supplement

Here is a question for you; how are you sleeping at the moment? With the global pandemic 2020 has been a year of uncertainly and we’re all feeling very sleep-challenged! Because we value our beauty sleep, here at The Amazing Blog, we’ve been searching for calm amongst the chaos and trying out a new remedy, meet Vedic Essential with their GoodNight Food Supplement.

Vedic Essentials is a new brand established in 2019 here in the UK, with their main focus around the ancient practice of Ayurvedic medicine, which has been used for over 3000 years in India. Vedic Essentials continue this Ayurvedic legacy but with a bit of a twist, as they infuse it with modern science too. They believe that ‘without health, nothing else matters’ and instead of letting someone else take control of your well-being, it metaphorically speaking puts you behind the wheel with their supplements. They specialise in producing high-quality supplements and remedies, and unlike modern medicine, they focus on the body’s power to heal itself using natural ingredients and herbs. In the practice of this Ayurveda, there is order and disorder in nature and the body. Therefore, good health is considered as order, and a disease is a disorder. Thus, to help maintain this balance in the body, Ayurveda focuses on the mind, body and consciousness to get them to work in harmony to maintain a balance. 

We were excited to receive their GoodNight Food Supplement that we are going to be talking about today, which we subsequently learned have been flying off the shelves! These capsules have a blend of six key natural ingredients. First, we have chamomile known for its ability to reduce anxiety and stress, therefore promoting better sleep. Chamomile has long been recognised for its calming properties. Then there is soothing blend in the ashwagandha one of the most important herbs in Ayurveda, apart from helping the body manage stress and anxiety, it is probably best known for fighting insomnia and stimulating the brain against depression. The reishi mushroom here is to boost the immune function and help with fatigue. Schisandra berry is proven to reduce cortisol levels in the body (the stress hormone) and is effective in controlling changes in serotonin and adrenaline providing you with a goodnight's sleep. The fifth element in this blend is the Maca which will improve your mental well-being and mood, and finally, there is Hops extract, which promotes a better sleep cycle. Besides these six key ingredients, this GoodNight supplement is rich in 5-HTP derived from griffonia, which has been proven to increase the feel-good hormone serotonin and is a naturally occurring amino acid that induces a calming effect on the brain. There’s magnesium, known for its ability to relax the mind and contribute to the reduction of tiredness and fatigue. Last but not least, it contains vitamin B6, which helps in maintaining a positive and relaxed mood. 

We took one capsule in between supper and bedtime, the effect was gradual where it took about three or four days to kick in and have an optimum effect, quietening the mind and offering a better quality of sleep. We’d recommend these as an excellent aid to help the body and mind regulate and rebalancing itself, this GoodNight Food Supplement is suitable for vegans are gluten-free and non-GMO, and you can find them here for £17.99.

GÍÍLINEA BÍO: Organic Anti-Ageing Elixir & 24hr Advanced Moisturiser

We always like to look a little further afield than the UK for some of our skincare features and today’s products are from the dreamy landscapes of Austria. Meet the certified organic and vegan brand GÍÍLINEA BÍO with their latest Organic Anti-Ageing Elixir Serum and 24hr Advance Moisturiser. We at The Amazing Blog have reviewed one of their body care product in the past here.  What we like about this brand is that they have quality and transparency with this family-run business that sources 98% of their ingredients from organic farms.

GÍÍLINEA BÍO was founded by Franz Leibetseder who grew up surrounded by a family of chemists, which fired his passion for herbs and natural remedies. It started out selling products to regional pharmacies and stores but has since grown and distributed throughout Austria, Germany and Switzerland. Best known for their use of aloe vera barbadensis harnessing its healing, skin-nurturing anti-ageing power. GÍÍLINEA BÍO only uses the aloe vera gel in its purest form. Products are manufactured partly in Austria and Italy where most of the ingredients (long list here!) like argan and olive oil, apricot and pomegranate seed oil, rosemary and lavender extracts, hibiscus seed and grape seed oil and shea butter are grown, harvest and immediately dispensed into the products. These natural ingredients always hold their freshness because the plants are not processed with heat but cold-pressed, which makes the actives stay fresh longer. GÍÍLINEA BÍO firmly believes that by using plant-based products in their skin and haircare positively enhances wellbeing. All products are certified organic, vegan and cruelty-free. No silicones, paragons, sulphate or nanoparticles are used. As well as PEG´s, mineral oils, synthetic fragrances or pigments.

We must also mention that we applaud GÍÍLINEA BÍO for their giving-back policy.  They’ve been working with likeminded partners on a rainforest project in Brazil, see here; ​and have developed a coffee project with sale of Bio Café Art&Child coffee where they support a street child project UÈRE in Brazil, you can help by buying their coffee online here.

Today we’ve brought to you yet another one of #amazingfinds from the power of nature itself with the GÍÍLINEA BÍO Organic Anti-Ageing Elixir, a serum from their special treatment range. They call it a ‘powerful elixir’ and this subtly fruity-scented serum contains their hero ingredient of aloe vera, an antioxidant, that combats free radicals which ultimately helps to slow the ageing process and improves collagen production and skin elasticity. It also has glycerine which will hold the moisture and give it a youthful glow.  We certainly found that this serum gave our skin a wonderful glow! The argan oil and hibiscus seed extract not only helps with the age spots but it gives an overall feeling of freshness, and a younger smoother-looking complexion. It has natural fruit acids that purify skin by removing dead skin and improves cell regeneration. The wheat germ oil extracted is a rich source of vitamin E, which helps reduce skin damage, fight free radicals, and support collagen formation and helps to maintain an even skin tone. While the hyaluronic acid plumps and gets rid of all fine lines. Thanks to the combination of all these natural actives, it instantly gives good natural cell renewal and a natural lifting effect. They advise applying one drop on your face, neck, and décolleté (and even on the eyes!) night and day before moisturiser. If you have oily or combination skin, this can be used solo.

Then this Elixir can be followed with their 24hr Advanced Moisturiser. This floral-scented lotion is in an air pump bottle, it’s particularly recommended for stressed skin. It absorbs really quickly and contains water and aloe vera making it ideal as eye care because of the soothing, hydrating and refreshing qualities it offers.  There is sweet almond oil extract that protects the skin from UV ray damages and helps your skin look smooth and free of fine lines. The fatty acids in the almond oil also help in maintaining the moisture in your skin making it glowy. This wonderful 24hr Advanced Moisturiser also contains jojoba oil which helps in regulating the sebum production, while the pomegranate oil in it has potent anti-inflammatory and anti-aging properties and fends off free radicals. Just like its name indicates, this moisturiser is long-lasting and can be applied day and night (we suggest after the Anti-Ageing Elixir). You can find the Anti-Ageing Elixir serum here for 61.90€ and the 24hr Advanced Moisturiser here for 36.9€ 

nknaturals - Summer Collection

At The Amazing Blog we first discovered today’s skincare brand when their Cleansing Balm ‘Beautiful’  was listed among the finalists in The Beauty Shortlist Awards 2019. We’re excited to be featuring nknaturals today with their natural skincare to coordinate with the seasons. As we know only too well, with each new season brings new environmental challenges for the skin. This is where nknaturals have rather cleverly incorporated seasonal ingredients to help the skin adapt.  

Nicola Kidd the founder, has had a life-long interest in skincare, from a trainee scientist in skincare development at Boots through to the start of creating her own small natural artisan skincare range in Lanzarote during 2011. It was only 2017, after moving back to London that these seasonal collections were born. She soon realised that having only one type of skincare routine for all year round wasn’t enough. Nicola found her skin reacting differently to the changeable British weather, which is where her inspiration came for creating Spring, Winter, Autumn (and now Summer) Collections. Just as we buy seasonal food ingredients, each of nknaturals product ingredients follows the lunar calendar, being optimised the benefits of each new moon. Plus, nknaturals only uses locally sourced ingredients that are non-GMO and free from pesticides. We also love that she uses beeswax from local independent beekeepers.  Nicola said: “This is essential to support the wellbeing of the bee population in England and completely different to mass bee farming. None of my formulations contains more than eight ingredients in total to maximise each of their qualities and when blended they enhance each other.” This sunny and joyful Summer Collection has five energising, luxurious and natural products to help to fight the rising temperature and humidity. Nicola believes in using a minimal amount of ingredients in order to enhance the effect of the products. Therefore, when blended all together each ingredient intensifies the other, thus creating the perfect formula.

First, we tried the Summer Concentrated Cleansing Balm in 60ml. nknaturals are probably best known for their balms. This new Summer Concentrated Cleansing Balm contains sesame oil, vitamin E, sea buckthorn, spikenard, red raspberry seed oil, frangipani. However, what makes it unique is its richness with the raw organic beeswax where the brand uses local beekeepers. This handmade balm, with its organic bee wax, gives it the bonus of healing capabilities and provides natural hydration to the skin. Rich in vitamin A, the beeswax will support cell regeneration and creates a skin barrier. We found the best way to use it, is by working a small amount into the skin then wiping it away with a damp muslin cloth - both morning and evening. It leaves the face both supple and smelling divine. They also suggest following the cleansing balm with the Summer Copper Distilled Botanical Mist.

This Summer Copper Distilled Botanical Mist is ideal for rebalancing the skin’s pH and unclogging the pores. Restoring moisture, it provides instant relief for any over-sunned skin which could be either parched or clammy. We think this is an essential item to keep in your bag while out and about, as it refreshes, soothes and invigorates tired skin. Ingredients include cedarwood hydrosol which acts as an anti-inflammatory agent and grapefruit seed which is anti-bacterial and helps to regulate any oil build-up. This mist gives a sense of wellbeing and calmness. We used this Botanical Mist with every step in the range from cleansing, moisturising to the home halotherapy (steam inhalation with the Summer Deep Steam Salt Infusion).

Then we have the Summer Enriched Protection Moisturiser available in 60ml. This lightweight daily moisturiser is for face, neck and décolleté. It absorbs quickly leaving no residue and offers enough hydration to keep skin moistured all day long. Key ingredients are again sesame oil, beeswax, vitamin E, sea buckthorn, red raspberry seed oil, spikenard, cedarwood oil, frangipani. What makes it a perfect skin balancer or even a great first base for make-up is the oat kernel flour. The latter provides a silky feeling to the skin with the lipids and ceramides and reduces redness and skin irritation while also hydrating and protecting the skin. Finally, the addition here of titanium dioxide, which is an anti-inflammatory and helps to provide a protecting barrier against UV rays. 

At night we used the Summer Nutrient Rich Facial Oil available in 15ml. This hand-blended facial oil with its a lymphatic drainage effect should be ideally massaged into the face before bed. It has wonderful regenerative qualities with the sesame oil, which is non-comedogenic (meaning that it doesn’t clog pores) and also acts as an antioxidant and anti-inflammatory on the skin. It also contains red raspberry seed oil that helps soothe the skin and heal redness and eczema, reducing flare-ups. This Oil has sea buckthorn as well as, cedarwood oil, spikenard and frangipani all of which can help uplift the mood while still deeply hydrating the skin. They also suggest using the Botanical Mist before use.

Last but not least, we have the Summer Deep Steam Salt Infusion available in 120ml. This salt infusion should only to be used once a week, preferably in the evenings. They suggest using these as halotherapy (a steaming technique) in a skin routine to open pores and act as a deep cleanser. The salt infusion is made out of vanilla pod rich in vitamin B and antioxidants that help it deep cleanse the skin and aid conditions such as acne. It also contains sea buckthorn berries a ‘superfood’ known for their ability to hydrate and provide skin elasticity. This Summer  Deep Steam Salt Infusion also contains Atlantic Sea and Himalayan salts that have detoxifying powers and increase circulation as well. And let’s not forget the air-dried rose petals a skin cleanser and another antioxidant. All-in-all, we think this product is a bit of a wonder treatment for the skin.

Tempted by this Summer Collection? Then see here where all these products can be bought individually or you can get the entire bundle for £85.