£4 for a date with a scrubber! (Lush Coalface)

Member Name: Sarccyslayer

Product:	Lush Coalface
Date:	04/08/09 (204 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Smells wonderful, cleans and refreshes the skin, easy to buy

Disadvantages: None it is brilliant

Having used the Neutrogena Cleanser for some months now I need to buy some new pads for it and my local Superdrug didn't have any, so I needed something else to use in its place and with nothing taking my fancy I headed to Lush.

Lush have an array of cleansers and whilst most people would think they came in squeezy tubes, Lush have decided that actually they don't have to and they have made some solid cleansers which have the bar of soap look about them, but naturally as they are made by Lush they are much more exciting, well for me they are anyway.

So what is a cleanser and why do I need one? A cleanser is a facial care product that is used to remove make-up, dead skin cells, oil, dirt and other types of pollutants from the skin of the face and it also helps to unclog pores. In many ways a cleanser is a bar of soap but they are made and designed with specific reasons in mind such as oily skin, dry skin, combination skin and so on. I use a cleanser because I find using soap on my face dries my skin out and I have in my lifetime tried many different kinds of soap, even the ones which have a low pH and that are marketed as being kind to the skin. So that is why I have in the absence of Neutrogena turned my attention to Lush.

My skin can be a nightmare, I have combination skin which means that it is usually oily on my T-zone (chin, nose and forehead between my eyebrows) but dry on my cheeks and the top of my head, so I need to use a product which doesn't make any of the conditions any worse and finding a product to suit my needs has in the past been a nightmare, so I decided to try a Lush product after all it is very rare a product has let me down and there is a huge choice to select from.

Coal Face is a product that I have read many reviews about on Lush, it isnt something to new within the Lush range, if anything it is one of their trusted favourties which is very propular I was informed. To look at Coal face resembles a piece of Coal but it could be a bar of soap, it has no distinguishing character to set it apart from with, only that if it was a lump of coal then I would expect it to be a bit more of a unqiue shape rather than having nice rounded off corners. However putting its shape aside, it is pure black in colour and it smells of liquorice, a smell which I adore so we are already partly sold on this product and it retails at a rather odd price of £4.04 for a lump which I estimate is around 150g but you can buy smaller bits for a smaller price, I just buy the first bit I see and have it wrapped.

I have never used a cleanser in this form before and by that I mean a hard rounded cleansing bar, sure I have used a bar of soap before but in the past all of the cleansers I have used have been liquids. However when it comes to using it, the lovely girl in the Lush shop gave me a demonstation and basically it is like using a bar of soap (so make sure you buy a piece that fits into the palms of your hands to make it easy to hold) and you simply need to make sure that there is some water in your sink and then place it into the warm water for a few seconds, I left mine in whilst I ensured my face was slightly wet, and then lifting it out into the palms of your hands, rub the bar between them and then apply the lather to your face. For a product which is pitch black in colour, I expected the lather to also be black and thus my face turning black as I used it, but no the lather was a smokey grey colour and when applied to my face, but it does lather really well and as well s being a cleanser it does also exfoliate your face because there are smaller ground pieces of actual coal within the cleansing bar which act as the exfoliators to remove dead skin cells from your face. The small pieces of coal are barely noticable until you massage your face and then you can feel them slightly working to remove the dead skin cells. After you have finished massaging the cleanser on and around your face and neck, you simply rinse off using warm water and then pat your skin dry.

A few of the reviews I have read about this product has some people mentioning the need to add a mosituriser to their face after using because their skin felt quite dry, my skin however was silky smooth to the touch and I didn't feel the need to use a moisturiser, although as part of my routine I do use one anyway.

The smell for me is brilliant, I love it. The ingredients are quite varied and there are a lot of them but for me the main ones are Liquorice root which is used to soothe and open pores which enables further ingredients an opportunity to remove dirt and other pollutants from them. Liquorice root is also known for its anti-inflammatory properties making it helpful for those people who suffer with dry or irritated skin and is championed for helping people who suffer from acne. Liquorice root also softens and smoothes the skin too. Following on from that we have Rosewood Oil which is quite floral smelling and is used in a lot of Lush products. For this purpose however the Rosewood Oil is excellent for skin cell and tissue rejuvenation and is a perfect remedy for those people, like me, who suffer with dry and oily skin. Rosewood Oil is also kind to mature skin and helps to deal with fine lines and wrinkles. Sandalwood oil has many uses for different skin types. Firstly it helps to relieve itching and inflammation of the skin which people with dry skin often suffer from, it also helps to rehydrate the skin and with its astringent properties (which means it helps to neutralize excess oils, help remove dirt and grime from the skin etc...) it helps those of us who have oily skin. The final ingredient is charcoal. Charcoal is burnt wood and used in a product such as this cleansing bar its specific role is to absorb excess oil from the skin to leave it feeling and looking relaxed, refreshed and comfortable. It also helps to draw impurities such as dirt and grime from the skin to unclog pores, as well as excess sebum which creates the oily skin effect, particularly around the t-zone and it acts as an exfoliator to remove dead skin cells and by doing all of this and working along the Sandalwood and Rosewood Oils you are left with smooth, soft and supple skin which feels refreshed and clean.

I adore this product and only have good things to say about this cleanser because it has proved to be perfect for my skin type and it does help to deal with both the dry skin on my cheeks and my oily t-zone and for £4 I am more than happy to pay that again as soon as my current block of Coal Face runs out. So far having used Coal Face every other day, I still have over half the block left, so it does last a really long time. It makes my skin feel soft, smooth and supple and deals with the underlying problems during the period of time in which I need to use it, it hasn't been a cure but then it never promised it would be.

My only advice to anyone who does buy and use this product is to get something to keep it in because if you leave it on the edge of your sink or bath, underneath the block when you next use it will be a black mark where it has dried out. I keep mine in a soap tin that I bought from Lush many moons ago now and it has proved to be very useful for storage ever since.

Summary: A liquorice smelling cleansing bar from Lush