Zest Hair Gelly

I cannot say that I'm ever enamoured when Lush bring out new hair styling products - simply because it's not an area of cosmetics that I'm particular interested in. After years of abusing my hair with cheap shampoos, over-dying, straightening and hair spray, I've fought so hard to restore and retain my youthful locks in as natural a way as possible. Now that my hair has forgiven me, I'm not about to revert back to using cosmetics that dry or damage my hair again. 

However, ever since I discovered Sea Spray and have been using it religiously ever since, I'm a little less reluctant to test out styling products, as long as they're natural, of course.

Zest Hair Gelly is a new and innovative styling gel, designed to mould and hold hair without leaving it greasy or feeling heavy. Unlike any of Lush's previous hair-styling products, or indeed any other company's styling products that I've come across, this item is solid in consistency. It's almost identical to the shower jellies that the company offer, although a little softer and slightly more stickier to touch. 

Containing wild orange, petitgrain and neroli oils, these ingredients not only give this product a potent citrus smell, but help to create a hair gel that both performs effectively as well as conditions and moisturises the hair. 

In fact, it is Zest's strong scent that first grabbed my attention when it arrived in the post. To me, the scent is dominated by the fresh orange juice that features as one of it's main ingredients. This overpowering citrus fragrance is coupled with petitgrain oil - a fresh, green and woody aroma that gives this gel a unique but very natural smell. It's a scent that wouldn't work as a body lotion or anything that requires you to smother on your body, but is a lot better smelling than any other hair styling product I've used before. 

As per usual, Lush have included many of these key ingredients to perform multiple jobs whilst still creating an effective gel; orange is great for rejuvenation, helping to soften your hair without drying it out. It also supports those of us with dyed hair as it helps to brighten your locks; the various oils hydrating and conditioning your hair whilst this is going on.

To use, the tub recommends that you tip the jelly into your hands, where you transfer it backwards and forwards between your palms. Once some of the product rubs off onto your hands, you should pop the chunk of jelly back in the tub and then style your hair as you please. I found that this works really effectively and I was left with the perfect amount to use on my hair. 

As I often wear my hair down, I used Zest to style and set the front of my head so that the little wayward strands I normally deal with were kept in place. I found that this was really effective and kept my hair in place for the majority of the day, without leaving it greasy or dry. In fact, once I had styled my hair, it didn't feel as if there was anything in my hair at all; neither was their any evidence to show I my hair was anything but natural - factors I was very happy with. 

The only problem that I wondered might happen with Zest, is that it could end up being a little greasy for those of you with more oily hair. This didn't happen with me because I have quite dry hair although I'd be interested to hear from those of you with different hair types. Furthermore, I'm not sure whether or not this jelly would be very effective at doing anything other than 'flattening' stray hairs - I definitely cannot see this helping to hold hair in place for those of you who enjoy styling it to great extremes. Having said that, I'm not sure whether this product is really meant for this sort of styling anyway...

Overall, it's a good quality product and I will definitely enjoy using my tub. However, it's not good enough to replace my much loved Sea Spray, so not a product I'll be using regularly. 

Quantitatives Ingredients: Glycerine, Fresh Organic Orange Juice, Water (Aqua), PVP, Perfume, DRF Alcohol, Carrageenan Extract, Sweet Wild Orange Oil, Tagetes Oil, Petitgrain Oil, Violet Leaf Absolute, Lilial, Citral, Farnesol, Geraniol, Hydroxycitronellal, Limonene, Linalool.

Vegan?: Yes.