Updated. A pip squeak of a soap (Carmen Miranda Lush soap)

Member Name: duskmaiden

Product:	Carmen Miranda Lush soap
Date:	16/03/03 (125 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Nice smell, pretty, looks good enough to eat

Disadvantages: Not as good as some of their other products

I have been busy tarting up some of my feeble pathetic early opinions to give them that Dusk touch!! This was my first ever opinion and it was terrible!

The Mission. Operation Smelly Skin!!

I know some people are going to groan when they read this opinion. For some (mostly female) Lush products are a heavenly treat with an almost addictive nature whilst for others (mostly men) Lush is that stinky over priced shop whose products clog up their bathroom shelves and the indexes of recently written reviews of opinion sites. I am one of the former. I can not get enough of lush but unfortunately there is one slight problem. There is no Lush shop in Manchester. Instead I have to do holy pilgrimages to shops around the country. My last such pilgrimage was in Edinburgh in March of this year. The mission of that auricular visit was to find a soap as addictive and full of aroma as my believed Gingerman that had been discontinued in the UK a few months previous.

What is Lush?
For those who have been hiding under a stone for ten years Lush is a fantastic shop smelling innovative, fun and freshly made cosmetics and toiletries which are made of high quality ingredients and not tested on animals. They are most famous for their bath bombs but this review is on one of their newest soaps Carmen Miranda.

Anyway once in the Princes Street store in Edinburgh I set about choosing my goodies. Once the bath bombs and the essential massage bar for fun with Duskman were selected it was the turn of the soaps. Lush soaps are presented in large blocks like cheese in the deli section of the supermarket and are cut and weighed the same way. While scanning over the different soap blocks my eyes settled on Carmen Miranda. Named after the calypso singer with fruit for a head dress Carmen Miranda is a lovely pastel green with different pastel colours marbled throughout. Sitting there it looked more like a chunk of nougat than soap. I picked it up and
s smelled it and decided that was the one to purchase.

When I got home to the safety of Chez Dusk I leapt into the shower to test this new product. I unwrapped the packaging which to continue the supermarket deli theme is wrapped in paper with a sticker telling you what it is and the weight and price per kilogram and got ready to feel the Lush magic.

The Smell
The soap is supposed to be a fruity little number and it is. Although the main ingredient in the soap is fresh kiwi fruit it was hard to pin down the actual smell. It is almost too sweet. Duskman likened the smell to a chew bar. I just hope he does not take a bite out of it or me since I smelled good enough to eat. The Kiwi fruit is there because of its natural toning enzymes and is a gentle astringent
Using the soap.
When using the soap little black specks are revealed. No Lush should not be shut down for health and safety reasons they are not mouse droppings they are in fact seeds from the kiwi fruit used to make the soap. I am sure they are there for a reason. My guess is as an exfoliatior but I was really not sure about them at all.




The soap in use

The soap got me in a real lather as it produced nice soapy suds. The smelling when washing is not as strong as when it is dry and no way as strong as other Lush soaps.


Ingredients: Water (Aqua), Propylene Glycol, Sodium Palm Kernelate, Sodium Stearate, Perfume, Fresh Kiwi Fruit (Actinidia Chinensis), Ylang Ylang Petal Oil (Cananga Odorata), Myrrh Resinoid (Commiphora Myrrha), Juniperberry Oil (Juniperus Communis), Bergamot Oil (Citrus Bergamia), Glycerine, Sodium Chloride, Tetrasodium EDTA, Gardenia Extract (Gardenia Jasminoides), Titanium Dioxide, Colour 18050 & 42045

Availability.
Sorry this is only available in lush stores. For those of you who are nowhere near a store you can get it mail order via catalogue or over the web.

The cost.
I do not remembe
r the cost exactly but it was about £2. It is not the cheapest soap but a little goes along way. I think my block lasted me at least a month. Like all lush products this would be excellent as a gift as long as the person does not take it the wrong way and think you are being rude about their personal hygiene.
Like all Lush products this soap is suitable for vegetarians.
There is a website www.lush.co.uk which I can never get into (perhaps a good thing)

Carmen Miranda has a lovely not too strung soap, looks nice and works well. However it will never replace my beloved Gingerman and I will keep searching to find a soap I can fall in love with and totally immerse myself in.

Summary: