I received an sms invite to a Clarins (pronunciation: “kla-rans”) Skincare Workshop last March 10 (Saturday) at the East Café in Rustan’s Makati. Knowing Clarins as an excellent beauty brand and East Café as a lovely Asian restaurant, one can never refuse such an offer. So there I was with my sister-in-law enjoying some beauty tips, product samples and of course good food!
Clarins Philippines invited an International Skincare expert from Singapore - Ms. Cheryl Yong who engagingly discussed their new collection made for Asian skin called “White Plus HP” (Click to see Clarins White Plus range) and some beauty tips which I think is one of the best things I learned from this workshop. And I’m excited to share them with you!
First about their new range: Clarins White Plus HP is a patented innovation with the key ingredient of sea lily extract! (I don’t know with you but just the sound of “sea lily” makes me feel beautiful already!) So where do they get these beauties? They say that sea lily grows in large clusters on the coast of Brittany in France. What do sea lily does for the skin? It has a brightening action of its extract on the skin which: 1. helps control the excessive transfer of melanin towards the epidermis which is responsible for the formation of dark spots on the skin and 2. protects the skin from darkening and gives it a beautiful transparent, rosy glow. Sounds promising!
*A reminder ~ always ask for a sample before purchasing any product. You should be able to test it on your skin first so you’d know if it suits your skin type of not. Better be sure since products like these are considered as an investment.
What I can say: I’ve personally tried their give away sample for 5 days now and so far my skin is fine with it. Their serum and emulsion (day moisturizer) with SPF 20 feels nice on my skin, leaving it not too oily with a pleasant light scent on it. As for the brightening part… that I still have to see.
Next thing I want to share is about their…*ten-tenenen-tenen! BEAUTY TIP…a Clarins secret! Are you ready for this? First time I heard about this tip was from my make-up artist friend. This time, I was able to hear and see how it’s done the Clarins way! Now, let’s just picture that you’ve already purchased your beauty products and you’ve got 8 of them! Haha that’s a lot but personally I just use an ordinary facial cleanser, toner (the dermatologist told me so), serum and moisturizer sample from Clarins, eye cream and lip balm. Close to 8 but what to do with these products? I’m used to rubbing some of them on my poor face until I learned the right way to apply them. So here it is, The Clarins Touch Tips (Ready?):
Tip #1: Warm product in your hands to bring it to skin temperature to encourage better absorption of your products. (To activate the ingredients of your product too.)
Tip #2: Apply products with the whole surface of the hands. Do not pull or rub your skin. (Errg, my mistake!)
Tip #3: Apply firm but gentle pressing motions to stimulate microcirculation and more effectively eliminate toxins from skin.
It doesn’t just feel good on your skin (a light & relaxing massage to your tired skin), it’s also nourishing from within. More about the Clarins way: Click for the Clarins beauty tips in video!
A sweet ending & realization: Although there are many whitening products available for Asian women nowadays, I would like to see women in our region to fully love and be confident in their own skin. We are blessed to have a variety of skin tones which people from the other side of the world are desiring to have. I used to wish I have a more fair skin just like my brothers but I learned over time to appreciate my own. I love having an olive complexion! And it’s just awesome to hear a product like that of Clarins which doesn’t “whiten” you like an “espasol” (a Filipino dessert which is finished off by rolling on flour) but just improves your skin by means of “brightening” it. Whitening and brightening are two different words. I’d go for brightening from the inside out.
