Berrylicious! (Lush Very Berry)

Member Name: sweetpea01

Product:	Lush Very Berry
Date:	05/07/09 (23 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Great selection of goodies

Disadvantages: None

Oh how I love this gift!! I received this as an "Im sorry" gift from Mr Sweetpea who'd missed our anniversary due to work. He could not of picked a more wonderful gift! I absolutely adore it! Apart from its wrapped in the most beautifully bright pink wrapping paper and tied together with a thick deep purple bow its also packed full of some great items, for once Lush have created a superb gift. The gift slightly changes from other EU countries, the UK has Yummy Yummy Yummy whereas say Austria for example has You Snap The Whip Body Butter - this I'd rather of had but I was still pleased!

It contains:- The Comforter Bubble Bar Slice, Sultana of Soap, Blackberry Bath Bomb, Sweetie Pie Shower Jelly, You Snap the Whip Body Butter or Yummy Yummy Yummy (Lush UK).

The Comforter:-

The Comforter is berry delicious. Berry, berry delicious. And if I were wise, I'd leave it at that, if only to force you to buy your own Comforter Bubble Bar so that it can speak for itself. But I'm not, so on I go. Let's start with this double-sized Bubble Bar's full name: The Comforter (Mark One). One can't help but note that Lush's founder, Mark Constantine, must have "won" a bet or one of his cheeky challenges against a fellow Lush "mafia" member, with this Bubble Bar being meant to "comfort" them for their loss. (Though in his usual, lovably naughty form, Mark made sure to reiterate the fact that he'd still gotten over on 'em! Great comfort, indeed!)

I like to call this "Berry Creamy Candy Bath", being that it is a playful cross between bubble gum sweetness and the blackberry fragrance of You Snap The Whip Body Butter. Quite unlike the herbal undertones you get with Skin Sin Body Lotion (which also contains Lush's blackberry perfume), you instead get undertones of rock candy. And speaking of Body Lotions, The Comforter is indeed "berry creamy"; it's one of the creamiest Bubble Bars to be sold by Lush in quite some time.

In the bath, your entire body is gently embraced by velvet oils, and you can't help but constantly stroke your skin while lounging about in the comforting Comforter's bubbling purpled pink waters, an experience that can only be described as having a friend comfort and calm you after a devastating incident, only to close the moment by saying something so funny that you can't help but laugh through your tears. This is always the perfect indication that your mate has done their job, and in much the same way, The Comforter does its job, too.

Sultana:-

Sultana Of Soap is packed with warm, rich, spicy sweet North African frankincense (also known as olibanum) oil and a dash of Italian bergamot orange, its creamy dome topped with dried fruits that recall Moroccan nougat: apricots, currants, and cranberries. And thanks to moisturising frankincense, Sultana Of Soap's lather is sumptuously creamy, leaving skin beautifully conditioned.

That would be enough exotic decadence in itself, but that Lush opted to overpower this soap's sweeter delights with a heady secret formula perfume ingredient to the degree where it's literally found in a larger quantity than any other fragrant ingredient in this soap's recipe, thereby leaving all those bits of dried fruit to contribute little beyond falling to the shower floor (where they resemble bunny turds as my best mate so eloquently describes them).

Once wet, this perfume combines with frankincense, hinting at a posh men's aftershave. Granted, we're talking the expensive £50 kind, not that cheap tat you find at a five and dime. Problem is, most posh aftershaves on the market consist primarily of synthetics, and despite Lush's openly aiming to veer away from synthetic scents, that's precisely what Sultana of Soap trades its natural fruit and spice essence in for. Hence, this soap's cologned fragrance -- both in the shower and on the skin -- is more sultan than sultana, making this a shower experience that is far better suited to the lads than to the ladies.

Blackberry:-

Blackberry was the first bath bomb ever made by Lush, back in the early 90s when they were a mail order company called Cosmetics To Go. When this bath bomb hits the water, it releases the richest, most playful purple hue known to all of bathing mankind, with the scent of fizzy grape (or, er...blackberry) soda tickling your nose. However, those who are expecting a foody fruity bath going by the name alone (shame on you, you should know better than to expect the expected from Lush scents by now!) might be disappointed: once it's dissolved, the sumptuously sweet notes (primarily Lush's secret perfume working in sync with frankincense) of this bath tend to fade to the background while a fruity, floral fragrance (primarily owed to bergamot, coming from the peel of Seville oranges) replaces it.

This isn't an altogether bad thing, of course, as this mutated scent is hardly displeasing! But one gets the feeling this mood-lifting, anti- depressant bath would be an even more lifting experience if all notes were permitted to sing in unison the entire time. SPOILER ALERT: This bath ballistic is topped with the word "BOMB" and releases a little sateen message tag that reads "Boom Boom!" I've seen others opine that this is rather silly or trite, but remember: Blackberry represents the birth of the bath bomb on planet Earth, and these gestures are meant to pay a fun tribute to that fact. Besides, the whole idea of Lush's calling these exploding balls of bath salts "Bath Bombs" in the first place was pretty dang witty, doncha think?

Sweetpie:-

This festive rectangle of purple jelly served with glimmering iridescent, party-rific confetti on top shares the same flawlessly delicious blackcurrant fragrance of You Snap the Whip Body Butter, with the delicious addition of a fresh cherry infusion. Now, had this scrumptiously sweet, fruity dessert of a shower jelly been a shower GEL, it would have EASILY gotten 5 raised glasses from me -- especially considering that it doubles as a wonderfully calming, softening shampoo as well. (YES, contrary to what others have said, Lush did indeed intend their shower jellies to double as shampoo, and they usually say so right there on the UK packaging.)

But that's not quite what happened, I'm afraid. Shower Jellies are neigh on impossible to use. First, you shouldn't order them from mail order because the clear plastic, snap-lidded deli/salad bar plates that they're sold in are NOT seal tight (to say the least), and these jellies find it very difficult to remain solid at room temperature even on Lush's own store shelves. Lush says you don't have to refrigerate or freeze their jellies, but they lie: you really do need to freeze shower jellies to make them manageable (and even then, they won't ever freeze entirely solid but will rather maintain their "wobbly" Jelly consistency.)

To shower with it, you can't pick up the whole slice at once, so you should cut it into smaller squares that will easily fit in the palm of your hand and/or you can squish them onto a nylon puff
(though that sorta defeats the purpose of having shower jellies in the first place.) But the problems don't stop there. Nononono. Using it directly on the skin means you'll keep dropping it every five seconds, and you'd better move fast if you want to retrieve your lost jelly before it dances down the drain. Even when you've got a good grip, tiny gelatinous blobs leap to the shower floor, leaving you to increasingly feel like a homeless person looking for spare change on the street as you try to retrieve each fallen morsel.

You Snap The Whip:-

You Snap The Whip is an intense, body scrubbing Body Butter with the deliciously sweet fragrance of blackcurrant cordials. And unlike the similarly scented Cherie Ripe Massage Bar and Skin Sin Body Lotion, there isn't a single note that gets in the way of its full-on berry-liciousness. You Snap The Whip contains mega-exfoliating pumice and ground charcoal, giving you a rough and rugged full- body exfoliation. But it's precisely the latter ingredient which gives this Body Butter its purple-black hue, certain to make an absolute mess of your shower (and soap dishes and shower caddies, and whatever else it comes in contact with - either directly or indirectly - whilst wet.

And though I've yet to witness such a thing, some people even claim to have wound up with charcoal stained skin, too!) You Snap The Whip is the boldest, mightiest exfoliant of the lot; with a lighter base of cocoa butter and macadamia oil, it contains more scrub than it does "butter." This gives it a bit more "grit", yet it also causes it to not only be less moisturising than some of the other
Body Butters, but also far quicker to melt away into nothingness. Everyone - especially notorious scrub meisters - will have to be super sparing if they want to get more than 2 full-body treatments from a single bar. (In which case, you'll still only manage to get 3 treatments maximum.)

If you're looking to get a bit more bang (and less mess) for your buck, unless you have oily skin and actually prefer less moisturisation, I'd recommend Buffy The Backside Slayer for an all-inclusive, spa-worthy, exfoliating/conditioning treatment, despite the lure of You Snap The Whip's addictive fragrance.

Yummy Yummy Yummy (UK Box only)

Lush's shower gels have always been a source of frustration to me. I can never find the right balance of moisture, scent, lather and texture in a scent I like. Perfectly pink in colour and to sniff out the bottle this has a lovely sweet scent however this is where the good points end. This is no typical shower gel, its more of a cream shower gel (or cream) and doesn't quite get the lather going however much you try.

Instead of the pretty, light fragrant scent you got when first sniffed, in the shower it turns in a sickly sweet, over the top honey fragrance which is good enough to make you feel quite ill. After I had gotten over the scent and I had appeared from the shower, the scent ends up quite subtle on the skin which isn't actually too bad and your skin does actually feel soft and moisturised. You get quite a bit for your money, but, unfortunately, half of it goes down the drain as the shower gel is very runny. I would compare the texture to whole milk, or heavy cream. The later is nonexistent as well.

What Lush say:-

"A juicy treat for fruity friends.
Very Berry was the name of one of our earliest solid shampoos. We like recycling so we dug it out to use on our beautifully pink and fruity gift. It smells so tasty that your senses tell you to pour yoghurt on it and eat it for breakfast, but instead we recommend unwrapping it from its deep berry handmade paper and lavishing the contents on your body".

Very Berry is available in store and online for £18.11 which I think is great value. I think Lush have actually excelled themselves with this gift, most if not all the items included are great sellers and this is a great girly gift. None of the items have that sickly sweet smell and they all seem to go well together. My advice is to buy it for yourself and indulge! Oh and don't share!!

Summary: A great gift and reasonably priced.