Bath And Body | Beauty and Fashion Tech

Style & Spa Chicago Skin Care Lines and Launch Party

Style&Spa Chicago has launched an all natural skin care line in the Chicago area, available at its spa locations and at Chicago area Walgreens.

Below is the company information about the lines:

Serenity Spa Products– These superior body treatments duplicate the experience of a professional spa therapy at home. The Serenity Spa Line gently exfoliates firms and replenishes beautiful skin with a more radiant texture. The four step line includes a firming body lotion, peppermint foot therapy, hydrating body crème concentrate and an exfoliating enzyme scrub.
Serenity Vitamin Skin Care Products – Our Serenity Skincare Line provides you with five easy steps to cleanse, hydrate and enrich skin to glow beautiful. Vitamin-rich formulas protect skin from environmental damage that triggers premature aging. Skin appears smooth, fresh, and healthy-looking. The five step skincare line includes a Vital Gel/Crème Cleanser, Vital Toner, Vital Moisture SPF15, Vital Nutrifying Crème and a Vital Eye Crème.
Serenity Holistic Line – Designed to fight the effects of environmental exposure, this line is created with apothecary formulas for clients who prefer a pared-down, no-nonsense regiment. The Serenity Holistic Line is bursting with nature’s best fruits, vegetable and botanical extracts. The products are naturally scented and wonderfully pampering and created to nourish skin as they reenergize the senses. The line includes three steps to youthful skin including 3-In-1 Body Oil, Hydrating Milk and a Peel-Off Mask.

I tried out a travel kit with Hydraessence products that anyone with dry skin would love. The kit contained the following:

Hydrating Cleansing Balm: A really nice cream cleanser that removes makeup, but leaves the skin feeling fresh and very moisturized. This was my favorite item in the kit! The texture is thicker than a cleansing milk, but not quite as thick as a true cream.
Essence of Hydration: An intensely hydrating serum.
Hydrating Crème Concentrate for Eyes: A good basic eye concentrate.
Hydrating Protection SPF 30: A nice SPF 30 hydrating lotion that really delivers with the moisture. l
Hydrating Crème Concentrate: This was my other favorite in the package. If you have very dry skin and need a good intense cream, take a look at this one. It has a rich, luxurious feel, provides deep moisture, yet absorbs well, without leaving anything greasy behind. Nice stuff!

If you are in the Chicago area and want to see the products up close, Style & Spa is hosting a Launch Party on October 3 at the East Bank Club in Chicago. The event will include hors d’ oeuvres, a serenity smoothies bar, mini-spa treatments and pampering gift bags. Entertainment will include Shari Addison of TV BET’s Sunday Best and music by renowned violinist, Stephanie Quinn. To be included on the guest list and attend at no cost, reservations must be made by September 25, 2009. For more information visit the Style & Spa Events Page.

Popularity: 2% [?]

Clean Logic Cucumber Melon Soap Sponge

Clean Logic makes a great Cucumber Melon glycerin soap with a built in sponge. Love it, love it, love it! It smells incredible and the sponge works well for cleaning after dirty jobs like gardening!

I find myself reaching for this one a lot after runs as well. The scent is just perfect for a fresh clean smell. I never thought I would rave about a soap so much, but I truly love this one! The company also makes some other neat bath products, including an exfoliating cloth that I like quite a bit.

Popularity: 2% [?]

Great Holiday Bath and Beauty Kits

Bath and Body spa kits make great holiday gifts. Just about everyone likes to pamper themselves from time to time, yet they might not want to buy themselves individual products to do so. During the holidays, great home spa kits seem to pop up every where. If you are hitting the stores, look in the beauty isles for fun kits. If shopping online, here are three recommended items:

I adore Bliss spa items, so the Best Of Bliss Kit is high on my personal wish list! This kit contains the best of the best from NY’s hottest spa and contains a bliss bag filled with deluxe trial sizes of lemon+sage body butter, hot salt scrub, high intensity hand cream, triple oxygen energizing mask and the youth as we know it moisture cream. $55 at Beauty.com

Another favorite of mine is Caudalie. The Vinotherapie Spa in the Box Set includes luxurious Crushed Cabernet Scrub, Hand and Nail Cream, Vine Peach Shower Gel, French-Milled Soap and Nourishing Body Lotion. $38.

For a value packed full home spa experience, check out the Borghese Essentially Borghese Holiday Gift Set. This kit offers 7 products from rejuvenating Fango Active Mud for Face and Body to gently cleansing Bagnodi Vita Gentle Foaming Bath Gel for Bath and Shower, to deeply intensive and protective moisturizers for face and body and soothing botanical eye compresses. $45

Comparison shop for spa kits

Popularity: 2% [?]

Small gifts and Stocking Stuffers

Need a small party gift? How about stocking stuffers? Something easy to carry? Try some of these!

The cute Anastasia Mini Brow Kit contains a mini tweezer that I found works quite well for its size, a mini matte highlighter, and clear brow gel.

I haven’t actually tried the ColorOn kits, but they look fun! For a unique gift, check out the ColorON Smokey Classics Kit .

The Tweezerman Blush Brush is an attractive retractable goat hair brush. Great for carrying in the purse. Tip: load up the brush before you go. Then you have an application available without needing to carry along your pan of blush!

This one is more expensive, but boy would I like to have it! The Red Flower Japan Travel Kit, Sento Set is great for the luxury spa lover on your list!

A quality face cloth also makes a great gift, and this one come highly rated. The Jane Iredale Magic Mitt won’t disturb the skin’s acid mantel when cleansing.

This is another more expensive one, but something that is well loved by many. Fresh Brown Sugar Body Scrub is an amazing and luxurious scrub for the bath.

Popularity: 2% [?]

Pink Product: Surgeon’s Skin Secret Beeswax Moisturizer

I love, love, love, grapefruit scented products. So it is no surprise that I took a shine to Surgeon’s Skin Secret Beeswax Moisturizer in grapefruit scent!

Packaged in a cute pink and white tube, $1 from each sale goes to Breastcancer.org. The moisturizer is a skin balm made with beeswax and grapefruit extract. The tube provides a good amount, and the twist up nature of it makes it perfect for applying to rough patches of skin without having to make a mess of your hands. It is nice stuff!

Surgeon’s Skin Secret is also available in an unscented version and numerous other scents.

Shop for Surgeon’s Skin Secret

BBNBCA

Popularity: 2% [?]

Philosophy Halloween Bath and Body Set

This is a really cute, and nicely scented Halloween set. The Philosophy Haunted House Set includes 6 oz. bottles of black licorice, caramel apple and pumpkin spice muffin high foaming shampoo, shower gel and bubble baths.

These are nice combo items and they really do smell great! I am in love with the black licorice used as a body wash! It is a nice scent for fall that isn’t too sweet.

Buy it for yourself as a seasonal treat (note that the scents will fit in seasonally well past Halloween) or give it as a fun seasonal gift!

The kit is $30 at $30.00 at philosophy.com, or individually in larger bottles for $16 each.

Shop for Philosophy Products

Popularity: 2% [?]

Five Great Uses for Creme de la Mer (Psst.. It Can Actually Be a Good Value)

Oh the joy of Creme de la Mer. Some swear by it. Others say it is over-rated. Most agree that it is expensive, and yes, if you use it as your daily face creme it is.. But if you use it for more limited purposes, it actually can become a pretty good value. I never apply it to my full face. Instead I stretch an ounce of the lovely thick creme for over a year using it in the following ways.

* As an eye creme. La Mer makes an expensive and rather small eye balm, but the creme works just as well. In fact it is one of the best dry skin eye creams I have found. A teeny tiny bit is all that is needed for some wonderful overnight hydration.

* Condition your lashes and brows. While you are putting a bit under your eyes, rub some into your lashes and onto your brows. It will not irritate your eyes and will condition both lashes and brows.

* As a sore skin treatment. Consider that terrible feeling and look of a nose that is raw and red after a bad cold. Regular lotion stings on the dry skin. But Creme de la Mer does not. I have found nothing better to treat a raw nose. Use it at the first signs of a cold and you can prevent it altogether.

* Dry skin spot treatment: Got patchy areas of super dry skin? Use a bit of Creme de la Mer on only those areas.

* Soften calluses. To help remove calluses, rub some high strength glycolic acid such as AB Skin Care Happy Feet (read review) on them and apply a bit of Creme de la Mer to seal it in and provide moisture.

Creme de la Mer is available online and in better department stores. For use in small areas, look for the smaller and much cheaper .24 Sample Size. A small tub will last quite a while if you are only using it as an eye or lash cream. My last sample size tub lasted 3-4 months because I only used it for my eyes.

Comparison shop for Creme de la Mer