• Beauty

The 1-minute, zero-waste face mask

Our co-founder Erica Watson puts this natural beauty hack to the test

I used to think DIY beauty was all a bit of a con. I mean how effective can slathering a sticky piece of aloe vera plant all over your face really be? Could some rolled oats and coconut oil really give me a youthful glow? I didn’t think so. But one nasty bout of dermatitis coupled with a severe case of dry winter skin and here we are, shunning all the regular products I once used and turning to the pantry in a bid to help my unhappy AF skin.

After reading up on the benefits of oats – natural exfoliant, anti-inflammatory, hypoallergenic – I decided an oatmeal mask had to be the way of the future. Well, my future at least, so I set about concocting my three ingredient wonder mix with the same enthusiasm Gwyneth Paltrow had for jade eggs and steaming her “Yoni”.

Full disclosure; was it the most instagram-worthy face mask? Absolutely not. Definitely some Hannibal Lecter vibes happening, not to mention some major LOLs from Jenny when I sent her the pics of myself mid-mask, but it felt instantly cooling as a I applied it and it didn’t make my face feel like it was about to crack in two as it dried.

Was it messy? Kinda. But as I started to remove it, the milky residue from the oats strangely enough, felt nice on my skin, and once I’d completely rinsed it off my face was pretty soft. But most importantly, it soothed my dermatitis so that was a real win-win as far as I was concerned.

So, if you’re looking for an affordable, totally toxin and package free face mask, and one that will soothe irritated skin, behold our DIY oatmeal face mask recipe:

What you’ll need

1 tablespoon of rolled oats

1/2 tablespoon of coconut oil

3 tablespoons of hot water

Mixing bowl

 

How-to

Melt the coconut oil into the hot water in your mixing bowl then add your rolled oats to form a paste. Apply to clean skin for 15 minutes before rinsing off.  If you’d like it to be more of a paste consistency we recommend soaking the oats in the coconut oil and water mixture for around 30 minutes – or longer – before applying it. I also used pure jojoba oil after I’d rinsed it off. Hello, happy face!

 

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