Smuggler's Soul Solid Perfume

I love the fact that Lush are re-releasing all of their perfumes in solid form and reverting the rather boring looking black tubes into these wonderfully quirky silver tins. There's something very alluring about the new designs and you cannot deny that they make a far more beautiful display on the shelf.

Smuggler's Soul was the product to start it all off. Chosen as one of three new Gorilla perfumes to get released through the Lush Kitchen, this exclusive beauty is a unique and very beautiful aromatic addition to the collection. You only have to bare witness to the wonderful green colour of the product to know that you've stumbled onto a winner. 

Described as being 'deep, dangerous and intoxicating', this solid perfume contains an abundance of both sandalwood and jojoba oil. The latter ingredient is an excellent natural moisturiser and this gives the perfume a silky smooth consistency - one that transfers from the tin onto your skin with ease. Despite claiming it contains lustre, I couldn't detect any in the pot or on my skin so don't be put off trying the product because of this reason.  

The sandalwood is what gives this product it's main note of fragrance. It's a very natural, light woody smell - one that thickens when it mixes with the warmth of your skin. Alongside this, the tagetes oil adds a sweet and very comforting aroma - it's almost a sugary smell and reminds me a little of old-fashioned cola. Imagine Karma without the potency and spiciness of the patchouli and you'll begin to understand how integral this ingredient is to the perfume. 

Finally, the lemongrass oil adds a fresh, grassy and rather gentle citrus element to the overall scent - it's not at all dominating in the mix but it compliments the other ingredients and helps to make this an uplifting and very warm fragrance. 

Unfortunately, despite it's beautiful aroma, Smuggler's Soul isn't very long-lasting. After massaging it into my wrists and neck, I found that I couldn't detect the perfume a mere fifteen minutes after it has been applied. I thought that perhaps it was one of those perfumes that's subtle on the wearer but leaves an impression on bystanders. However, neither of my flatmates were able to pick up the scent on me, even when I applied multiple helpings to my skin. 

In the tin, it's a wonderfully complex unisex perfume and one that could easily become a firm favourite in my household. However, it's staying power was shockingly short and I found it to be a bit of a wasted purchase. I only hope that the liquid equivalent of this can offer me more as it's a beautifully complex yet delightfully light aroma - one that could become a best seller for Lush.

Quantitative Ingredients: Organic Jojoba Oil, Castor Oil, Candelilla Wax, Perfume, Indian Sandalwood Oil, Sandalwood Oil, Madagascan Vetivert Oil, Tagetes Oil, Lemongrass Oil, Benzyl Alcohol, Benzyl Benzoate, Benzyl Salicylate, Citral, Coumarin, Eugenol, Farnesol, Geraniol, Isoeugenol, Limonene, Linalool, Methyl Ionone, Spring Green Lustre.

Vegan?: Yes.

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Deep Sleep Shower Jelly

This product has been on my shelf for near enough forever, and it was only when I was doing an inventory recently, that I realised I should have used it sooner. Throughout the beginning of this year, I suffered from a serious bout of insomnia, brought on because of the pressures of my teaching job. After multiple pills were shoved my way, none of which had any effect on my 'one-hour-a-night-habit', I began to think that I'd have to live like this until I collapsed from exhaustion. Thankfully, my sleeping is somewhat more substantial now, but this would have been a great product if I ever needed a natural remedy to bring about a good night's rest. 

Firstly, this jelly is beautiful; a wonderful deep orange colour with just the slightest pearly glisten to make it look that little bit more magical. Deep Sleep has tiny specks of golden glitter sprinkled within the product, which helps it to look just that little bit more appealing in the tub. Don't worry about the glitter through, it doesn't stick to your skin so you don't have to worry about getting covered in plastic lustre. 

Lush describe Deep Sleep Shower Jelly as an 'insomniac's salvation', and I can see why. Made from a combination of chamomile, lavender and just a hint of neroli, this is a shower jelly packed with essential natural ingredients to bring about a subdued state. 

The jelly possesses a very natural-smelling scent, mostly dominated by the lavender. This lavender smell is a strong, aromatic sort of fragrance, very similar to the scent of Lush's Angels On Bare Skin Facial Cleanser. To compliment this, Lush have included a slight orangey scent that comes through when using this jelly in the shower. This just makes the product's fragrance more uplifting and slightly sweet. Furthermore, I can also detect the chamomile smell coming through, which gives the jelly a nice floral and herbal scent. 

Like most of Lush's shower jellies, Deep Sleep contains multiple oils that not only adds to it's overall fragrance, but gives it moisturising properties. Lavender oil is known for it's antiseptic, antibacterial and deodorising effect; Neroli oil helps to improve the tone and texture of the skin. I found that this jelly felt very velvety and I did notice my skin became smoother and softer after using this. 

Unlike other jellies I have tried such as Sweetie Pie and Calacas, this one creates a more oily lather, which makes your skin feel incredible after use. Furthermore, it's quite a thick, elasticated sort of jelly which means you don't have to use as much as you normally would for jellies such as the ones I've mentioned above. Unfortunately, it is this latter point that also makes this product rather difficult to use. I cannot tell you the amount of times I have lost pieces down the drain whilst trying to lather this across my body. It's incredibly annoying.

However, this product does do what it's supposed to do when it comes to helping detox your mind from any worries or stresses that may be preventing you from sleeping. Neroli is one of the few essential oils to be scientifically proven to increase serotonin production in the brain, which enhances your mood and helps you to feel happier and more relaxed. Used alongside lavender oil, which is also supposed to help calm your senses, this jelly really does help you to feel your best and get a good night's sleep.

I can see why Deep Sleep is such a popular product from Lush, and it really does help aide a better night's rest. Despite this, there's still the issue with the wastage that comes with using such a fiddly product, and the smell doesn't stay on your skin, which was disappointing. Furthermore, I found the lavender scent a little overpowering at times, which is why I haven't rated this product as high as I could. 

Quantitative Ingredients: Glycerine, Sunflower Petals Infusion, Sodium Laureth Sulfate, Propylene Glycol, Sunflower Seed Infusion, Fresh Organic Orange Juice, Carrageenan Extract, Lavender Oil, Chamomile Oil, Lavender Absolute, Neroli Oil, *Linalool, Perfume, Gardenia Extract, Colour 14700, Methylparaben, Propylparaben, Radiant Gold Lustre.

Vegan?: Yes.

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Dragon's Egg Bath Bomb

...And God said 'let there be light' and there was light... In all honesty, I felt the same mixture of elation, wonderment and amazement the first time I used a Dragon's Egg Ballistic, as I can imagine somebody new to religion feeling, having read Genesis for the first time. Not that I'm comparing Christianity to a bath bomb; I'm merely trying to convey the sheer happiness I felt when trying out one of my, now, all time favourite bathing products.     

Lush describe the experience like this; 'As the white outer layer of Dragon’s Egg fizzes into a light, creamy foam, it releases a drift of dissolving dragon’s scales (rice paper confetti) and crackling popping candy. As its golden inner core is revealed, your bathwater is transformed into a shimmering amber. Its bergamot and citrus scents leave you feeling transformed and invigorated, so perfect for a morning bath.'

They say, never judge a book by it's cover, and this sentiment in definitely true when I'm talking about Dragon's Egg; It's plain white demeanour, with the odd colourful 'splodge' across it's shell, was not going to get my heart racing. However, this bath bomb immediately transformed my mind, and my bath tub, when it got to work in the tub.

This ballistic is one of the slower-working ones, so upon placing it in the water, it immediately begins to foam and froth; littering the surface with a creamy, white foam but without fizzing or immediately spewing out colour. As Dragon's Egg begins to dissolve, streaks of vibrant, golden-yellow begin to flow out of the bath bomb, creating a whirlpool of luxurious glittery patterns and swirls; very much like the yolk and 'white' of a real egg. 

This ballistic is a very tangy, zesty product, with heaps of ingredients to maintain the smell throughout the entire experience. The scent is very similar to that of Avobath, although I found this one to be a little more playful and slightly sweeter. It reminded me of the lemon sherbet I used to eat as a child - a memory that only served to strengthen my love of this ballistic. Furthermore, Dragon's Egg contains a mixture of citrus oils and bergamot oil, to not only give it an uplifting, refreshing fragrance, but help it to soften your skin while you're relaxing.

This product really is very invigorating, which is probably why Lush suggest you should use this first thing in the morning to wake you up. It's a great ballistic to use during the winter months; to perk up those over-worked senses, or simply to reenergise yourself after a stressful day. You really feel and smell like royalty after you've bathed in Dragon's Egg's wonderful waters. 

I absolutely adore this ballistic, and will always choose this over any other bath bomb in Lush's regular range. I cannot recommend this product enough, and only hope that all of my 'gushing' will convince you, that this is a product that needs to be experienced!

Quantitative Ingredients: Sodium Bicarbonate, Citric Acid, Perfume, Popping Candy, Lemon Oil, Bergamot Oil, Jasmine Absolute, Cream of Tartar, Water, Gardenia Extract, Sodium Laureth Sulfate, Propylene Glycol, Lauryl Betaine, *Citral, *Limonene, *Linalool, Gold Lustre, Radiant Gold Lustre, Colour 15510, Colour 17200, Colour 14700, Colour 45410, Rice Paper.

Vegan?: Yes.

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FUN With A Twist

As part of Lush's usual range, the company have a selection of five different scented FUN Bars that are available all year round. They are Pink FUN, which is a fruity candy smell, Yellow FUN, which has a vanilla scent, Red FUN, which is mandarin and orange, Green FUN, which possesses a lemon and lime scent, and Blue FUN, which offers a lavender scent.

Being one of the most versatile products they offer, as well as being good value for money, FUN is a wonderful concept that offers affordable cosmetics for those that aren't lucky enough to have their pockets lined with gold. Working as a shampoo, shower gel and bubble bar, a small 100g bar of FUN should be a steal at £5 a pop. But is it?

Recently, Lush extended it's family of FUN and released a limited edition Gold bar as part of their Christmas 2013 range, promising to release other uniquely scented variations in the near future. Two weeks ago, Lush kept their promise and released a brand new edition - FUN With A Twist. 

Initially, I was overwhelmed with excitement about this new product. Not only did it look beautiful - a decorative bright orange and deep purple dough, moulded and twisted together to make the most attractive FUN bar to date, but Lush described it as possessing both the Twilight and Dragon's Egg fragrances - two of my favourite smells to come from Lush. 

For those unfamiliar with these two smells (how is that possible?!), Twilight is a beautiful creamy, malty lavender aroma with elements of tonka to give it a sensual but vanillary note, while Dragon's egg offers a zesty, sherbet-y, playful burst of lemon and lime. Two completely different smells; two equally gorgeous aromas. 

When my FUN With A Twist arrived, I was immediately bowled over by it's scent - both of the different fragrances were clearly defined and they were equally potent in the wrapper. Up close, you could pick out the Twilight when sniffing the purple section, and the Dragon's Egg on the orange. Strangely, when smelling them together, it was the Twilight that shone through, yet it was the Dragon's Egg scent that came through more when being used in the bath. 

As with all of the FUN bars, I like to use mine as a replacement for more expensive bath ballistics, when I'm after a short bath as opposed to a longer soak. So I pulled off a generous sized chunk and crumbled it under the running tap. Immediately my bath tub began to fill with fluffy, zesty bubbles and the water merged into a lovely shade of orange. Unfortunately, both the colour of the water and the overall scent was lost quite a bit once my bath had been run, and I found that I could barely detect much of the fragrance at all within a matter of minutes. 

Secondly, whereas other Fun bars work almost as well as a bubble bar and leave my skin smooth to the touch, I found this one was very drying and the water felt rather rigid, almost as if I'd dissolved a piece of soap in the tub. Most of the bubbles stayed until the end of the experience, but the colour of the water turned a murky orange colour and my skin didn't seem to benefit from these aspects at all. 

On my second attempt at using this, I opted to use FUN With A Twist as a shower gel/soap and found that it lathered up quite well. I had to experiment with how much water to add to get a good lather going but it did seem to work very much like all of the other FUN bars I've tried. The lather is much thicker in consistency, and may need a little coaxing to spread across your skin, but the compressed format of the product means that a tiny piece will go a lot further than your usual splodge of shower gel and this makes it worthwhile. 

Using it in this way meant that I was able to see the specks of glitter that are distributed throughout the bar, and these tended to stay on my skin, although there was very little in the way of lustre and I couldn't find any on my skin once I'd rinsed myself off. 

Lavender, lemon and bergamot oils are just some of the ingredients used to try and help make FUN a moisturising, uplifting and refreshing product. While the scents are true to the original aromas, these smells were somewhat lost during use and I wouldn't say that this was the best product to use if you wanted to improve the condition of your skin.  

Overall, fans of these scents will no doubt be rather interested in trying out a new product, and if I was judging on smell and design alone, it would win many awards. However, I was a little disappointed with it's productivity and I feel the gimmick of FUN doesn't deter from the fact that I'd get a lot more out of a bubble bar, even if it works out more expensive.

Quantitative Ingredients: Talc, Cornflour, Glycerine, Sodium Laureth Sulfate, Lemon Oil, Bergamot Oil, Jasmine Absolute, Benzoin Resinoid, Tonka Absolute, Ylang Ylang Oil, Perfume, Citral, Geraniol, Coumarin, Linalool, Gold Glimmer Lustre, Snowflake Lustre.

Vegan?: Yes.

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Lush Kitchen Competition!

When I first heard about Lush's new Kitchen Initiative, I was really excited about the prospect of all of the new products being made available for me to try. Unfortunately, it has become a very expensive habit for someone like me, who cannot resist purchasing every single vegan product that they off. Furthermore,  Lush have made it very difficult for people outside of the UK to get their hands on these wonderful products. 

So I've decided to offer one Lush fan the chance to own some of the items that Lush have released so far.

Up for grabs is;

-1 tub of Dream Cream Self-Preserving Body Lotion
-1 Tub of Strawberry Twin Shower Jelly
-1 Hippy Chick Ballistic
-1 Error 404 Bath Bomb
-A Piece of Demon In The Dark Soap
-A Piece of Ice Blue Soap

plus...

-1 mystery item!

All of the above products are limited edition products, most of which you can no longer obtain. 

To be in with a chance to win the lot, all you have to do is leave a message (and your contact details) underneath this blog post. 

The competition will run until Friday May 16th, 9pm (English time). I will pick a winner using a random number selector so it is completely fair. Good luck!

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Error 404 Ballistic

When Lush first released pictures of products that were to feature in their kitchen initiative, one of the first ones that grabbed my attention was a rather splendid looking golden egg. To begin with, I thought that it was the rather lovely Golden Egg Ballistic that featured in this year's Easter range. However, on closer inspection, I realised that this was a different product completely and I was rather excited to try it out.

A few weeks ago, somebody within the Lush community notified me of an unknown page on Lush's website that seemed to suggest that you could 'purchase' this egg ballistic for free. It's not featured in any of their product lists, hasn't been showcased as a new product and can only be found when searching for it by name. 

Known as the Error 404 Ballistic, this egg-shaped bath product is currently available to buy on their website, but only for those with prior knowledge that it's even there. After a little research from myself, it transpired that aside from the chocolate variation that everyone knows and loves, the term 'Easter egg' also means 'an intentional inside joke or hidden message'. Often, these Easter eggs are featured within computer games and software, where bonus levels or characters can be obtained through secret coding and gameplay. However, Lush have taken this idea on board and created a secret product that can only be purchased if you're in the 'know-how'. Very clever!

There were a lot of rumours circulating that this bath bomb shares it's scent with the Snowcake family, which is part of the reason why I became so excited to try it out. Unfortunately, when my first two arrived yesterday morning, it was obvious that this wasn't the case. However, that's not to say that this isn't a wonderful ballistic in it's own right.

Firstly, this golden egg is beautiful to behold. Roughly the same size as the Golden Egg Ballistic, this bath bomb is decorated with a thick layer of golden lustre - a feature that may immediately warrant some Lush fans to panic over the mess it'll cause. Despite the fact that this glitter does tend to make your hands dirty when you pick it up, and I did find a collection of the power in the bottom of my packet, once it's been fully dissolved in the water there is very little evidence that the lustre was even there to begin with, and it definitely doesn't leave your bath tub covered in the stuff. Protruding from the surface of the egg are the numbers '404' and the back features a strange design that could possibly be homage to the first known Easter Egg which featured in an early Atari game. 

Concocted from a mixture of geranium oil, rosewood oil and orange flower absolute, this ballistic is a potent combination that grabs your senses before you've even peeled back the wrapper. It's the former ingredient that takes the lead here, offering you a strong, dry floral fragrance, with the rosewood adding a slightly woody element that you'd normally expect the inclusion of sandalwood to do. There is a slight hint of the orange here, but it's not until the bath bomb has been dissolved, that this comes to the forefront more and balances out the overall scent. 

When placed in the water, Error 404 immediately begins to froth and fizz, dispelling a thick, creamy layer of golden foam before unleashing streams of green and blue colour across the surface of the water. It's a slow and fairly quiet bath bomb, so takes almost five minutes to fully dissolve. Once it's finished, you're left with a lovely turquoise-coloured bath with the subtle shimmer of the gold, bronze and blue lustre.


Something, which could be seen as a positive or negative aspect with this ballistic, is that once it's dissolved, it's scent is somewhat dampened. I found that this product lost it's dry floral scent quite a bit, and this was replaced with more of a sweet orange fragrance with elements of the geranium displaced ever so slightly. It was rather pleasant.

I cannot place the scent of Error 404, but my memory does allude me to the fact that I have smelt this fragrance before. It reminds me very loosely of the recent African Paradise Body Conditioner, in the fact that they both have strong floral combinations. However, their scents are not the same. I'm hoping that somebody else may be able to direct me to where I recognise this smell from. 

I'm unsure how long Lush plan on making this product available for, but it's definitely worth picking up, if only to make your postage costs seem slightly more justified. It doesn't have any moisturising properties, working much like every other Lush ballistic, but that doesn't mean I didn't enjoy the experience it gave me.

I shall definitely be picking up a few more of these while I still can and I'm interested to see whether Lush will continue with this Easter Egg initiative, albeit releasing different products over time. 

Quantitative Ingredients: Sodium Bicarbonate, Citric Acid, Rosewood Oil, Geranium Oil, Orange Flower Absolute, Cream of Tartar, Gardenia Extract, Water (Aqua), Lilial, Citronellol, Coumarin, Geraniol, Linalool, Sodium Laureth Sulfate, Lauryl Betaine, Perfume, Antique Gold Lustre, Bronze Splendour Lustre, Glacier Blue Lustre, Colour 42053.

Vegan?: Yes.

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Midnight Massage Bar

When I first set my eyes on these massage bars back in 2012, I immediately fell in love with the design. What more can you ask for than a sensual, exotic-scented massage bar, shaped to look like one of Salvador Dali's 'Melted Clocks'. There's something extremely appealing about this product; it's almost a celebration of the romanticism of the 1920's/30's, and gives me that same nostalgia that I got when reading Brian Selznick's 'The Invention of Hugo Cabret'. 

Depending on when you purchased your Midnight Massage Bar, you might have one of two different shades. Earlier releases boasted a beautiful, rich peachy coloured bar with gold lustre decorating the face of the clock. However, when the bars were re-released for the Christmas 2013 retro range, the bar seemed to have lost it's glow, and is now a much more paler in colour. 

As the name suggests, this product can be used to aide a full body massage for one or more lucky people. However, it can also be used as a luxury alternative to a body lotion, which is what I tend to use it for. To melt the bar you rub it between your hands; your body temperature heats the oils up and causes the bar to melt slightly. Then simply use your fingers to glide over your skin and massage the oils across your body.

What I found with Midnight Massage, is that it's rather stubborn at giving away it's oils. Whereas Close To You or From Dusk Til' Dawn tend to begin melting immediately when in your hands, this bar took a little while to get to work. I tend to smear the massage bar across the areas of skin that I want, and then use my hands to spread the oils out across my whole body. However, with Midnight Massage, I had to rub it between my hands and then apply the oils this way, which took a little longer than usual. 

Much like all of Lush's other massage bars, this one has a ton of wonderful ingredients to give your skin a feast; cocoa butter, shea butter and olive oil are all present to help moisturise and remove dry, scaly skin; exotic fruits like figs, carob pods and quince fruit have been added as they are rich in antioxidants and good for the skin. Lush have then chosen a refined, sexy jasmine scent that will linger on the body long after your massage, ensuring the persistence of memory.

This bar is also one of the longer lasting ones. I got a good 15+ uses out of it, whereas some bars I only get 3-4. Furthermore, it holds it's shape really well so you won't have it crumbling or turning into a gloopy mess. 

Despite all of these attributes, I wasn't overly keen on the fragrance that Midnight Massage bar had to offer. The scent reminded me a little of when old Lush bath bombs begin to age and their scents somehow merge into one, unremarkable smell. Additionally, the bar was rather difficult to manoeuvre across the skin and I had to reapply the bar a few times just to get enough oil to moisturise my skin.  

Quantitative Ingredients: Cocoa Butter, Fair Trade Shea Butter, Fair Trade Olive Oil, Perfume, Fig, Carob pods and Quince Extract, Fair Trade Vanilla Absolute, Jasmine Absolute, Olive Leaf Absolute, Petitgrain Oil, *Benzyl Salicylate, *Cinnamyl Alcohol, *Geraniol, *Benzyl Benzoate, *Benzyl Cinnamate, *Farnesol, *Limonene, *Linalool, Benzyl Alcohol, Lustre Radiant Gold, Edible Lustre Radiant Gold.

Vegan?: Yes.

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Ballistic Bonanza Competition Winner!

Thank you so much to all who entered. I was completely blown away by the interest I received - you guys are amazing!

To make it fair, I've put the total amount of entries into a random number generator and the number 123 was chosen this time around. 

I then have the painstaking job of counting up the entries to find out who is the lucky winner. This time, the number 123 led me to alushiefix (http://alushiefix.tumblr.com/). I will be contacting them shortly to let them know the good news.

If you've been unsuccessful this time around, don't fret. I have an even bigger and better Lush competition coming up in a few days time, so keep your eyes peeled for that!

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Wonder Woohoo Bubble Bar

Wonder Woohoo is a limited edition bubble bar, released as part of the 2014 Mother's Day range. Inspired by Wonder Woman with it's golden lustre coating, this brand new product is fragranced with the wonderful The Sun; a staple perfume in my house.  

Bursting with Brazilian orange oil, sandalwood oil and mimosa absolute, this bubble bar is a fizzy, sweet and fruity product, similar in smell to the likes of Sunnyside and The Brightside. However, unlike both of those bubble bars, Wonder Woohoo possesses a more natural scent; it reminded me of fresh orange juice intertwined with a slightly wood element. Designed to bring happiness and joy to mums, and whoever has the luxury of using it, this bubble bar certain leaves you feeling relaxed and revigorated after a long day's work.

Like every other bubble bar, Wonder Woohoo can work in a number of ways. As you can see from the video, I often throw my bubble bars under a running tap, where more often than not they begin to bubble and froth quite quickly. However, I found that this one was a little stubborn to release those gorgeous bubbles so I chose to crumble the remainder of the bar under the tap, and as you can see, those much-wanted bubbles quickly filled the tub. 

Unfortunately, this product didn't produce as many bubbles as I would have expected, especially given that I used an entire bar in the bath. I used a third of a Comforter Bubble Bar last week, and this produced far more bubbles than this entire bar did. Furthermore, it also turned the bath water a slightly yellowy colour, which is not a colour you'd choose to bathe in if you had a choice. 

As for those of you worried about the use of glitter, you'll be glad to know that this bubble bar neither decorates your bath or your skin with annoying sparkly bits. You'll notice once the product has been dissolved into the water, that it leaves gorgeous trails of golden lustre throughout the tub, which then wash away easily at the end.

Despite it's wonderful smell in the packet, this bubble bar lost most of it's scent when in use. Once the bath had been run, and I had settled myself in the tub, I found that I could only pick up the scent occasionally, and this was normally when my nose was very close to the water. Lush have recently begun to use cornflour as one of their main ingredients in their bath products, and I wonder whether this has any correlation to these newer products containing less scent that normal. It's rather disappointing.

However, what Wonder Woohoo did do, was make my skin feel absolutely beautiful. Within minutes of being in the bath tub, my arms and legs felt incredibly soft and this continued into the following morning. I found that I didn't have to moisturise at all after this bath, which was nice. This softness was no doubt caused by the use of Sandalwood oil, an astringent and antiseptic ingredient that helps to soothe, cool and soften the skin. I just wish that my skin had retained some of it's scent as it would have been lovely to top up the smell with a little The Sun perfume and carry this fragrance around all day. 

Lush claim that The Sun fragrance is like 'a ray of sunshine in the depths of winter', which might explain why they decided to use it in one of their bubble bars. Wonder Woohoo is definitely an attractive looking product, and to smell in the shop, I can see why consumers would be interested in trying it out. However, it's beautiful scent is lost almost completely when in use, which was disappointing. While I cannot claim that the bathing experience was particularly euphoric, I can say that it made my skin hydrated and soft, and had this product's scent remained perennial in the water, it would have scored full marks from me. 

Quantitative Ingredients: Sodium Bicarbonate, Cream of Tartar, Sodium Laureth Sulfate, Lauryl Betaine, Radiant Gold Lustre, Cornflour, *Farnesol, *Limonene, Brazilian Orange Oil, Mimosa Absolute, New Caledonian Sandalwood Oil, Perfume, Colour 14700, Gold Glimmer Lustre

Vegan?: Yes.

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Golden Egg Bath Bomb

I knew when Golden Egg was first unleashed on the world, there would be a division of fans; on the one side there are those that get overly excited about anything glittery and will no doubt head straight for the most lustre-tastic looking product in the shop. Then there are those that sort of grimace at anything vaguely shiny and begin envisaging how much of a clean up there'll be after the bath. As for me, I'm one of those rarities that sort of balance precariously in the middle, hoping that lush have used the force of balance to create a product that can offer a sensual experience alongside one that's a little bit sparkly.

This product is new for 2014, although it shares it's scent with the Honey I Washed The Kids range so it's not all-together that new. What is unique about it however, is that it's composed of both a bath melt and a bath bomb, and it is this part that intrigued me the most. 

The outer shell is a glorious cocoa butter and sweet orange oil melt that, on contact with hot water, immediately begins to melt and ebb into the water, creating a beautiful stream of yellow foam. As Golden Egg continues to fizz, the bath bomb centre begins to release creamy white foam, which disperses into the tub and mixes with the yellow. The result is a wonderful, golden bath that possesses just the slightest hint of lustre. There's enough glitter to create a slight shimmer on and underneath the surface, but not enough that you have to worry about scrubbing it off of you afterwards. When the bath water has been drained, there is traces of the glitter left behind, but nothing that doesn't wash away after a splash of water. 

The best part about this product is that it gives off a wonderfully sumptuous and warming toffee and honey scent; it really is a rich treacly fragrance that wraps itself around you and leaves it's wonderful presence on your skin. I kept getting whiffs of this all night after I used one of these eggs, and it even stayed in my hair the following day. Furthermore, I love the fact that this product is vegan as I adore the Honey I Washed The Kids scent, yet can rarely buy any products with this smell as, like the title suggests, the products tend to contain honey. I love that Lush have found ways of producing this fragrance without using any animal derivatives. 

Lush claim that because the bath melt part of Golden Egg is rather heavy, this product sinks to the bottom of the tub before resurfacing when the ballistic part starts fizzing. However, I found that mine remained on the surface, which meant I was able to watch the egg spew out it's wonderful velvety entrails.

My only negative observation is that the bath melt part of Golden Egg is nowhere near as moisturising as other Lush bath melts have been in the past. When I was in the tub, I didn't notice any beads of cocoa butter or traces of oil like I would normally expect from such a product. Although my skin felt really smooth and soft afterwards, it didn't feel anything more than what I would expect an average bath bomb to do. 

Overall, this is a wonderful product, and one I will certainly buy a few more of before they are discontinued. The scent is strong and prominent throughout the entire bathing experience, something I value a lot with my bath products; definitely good value for money.

Quantitative Ingredients: Sodium Bicarbonate, Fair Trade Organic Colombian Cocoa Butter, Citric Acid, Laureth 4, Cream of Tartar, Sodium Laureth Sulfate, Perfume, Sweet Wild Orange Oil, Bergamot Oil, Olive Oil, Cornflour, Lauryl Betaine, Amyl Cinnamal, Citronellol, Geraniol, Lilial, *Linalool, *Limonene, Gardenia Extract, Colour 19140:1, Radiant Gold Lustre, Gold Glimmer Lustre.

Vegan?: Yes. 

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