The Monday Montage

The last seven days have seen weird things happening with my blog - not only have I had the urge to write lots more but the traffic coming to my little corner of the Internet has gone wild.

My review of Dirty Burger from earlier in the month received over 1,500 page views in a day, Lush I Should Coco from March over 300 and my tattoo article over 200.  

So what has BKUK offered to people stumbling across my pages over the last week?

Tigi Bedhead Supercharge Duo Giveaway

After being open for a month on Saturday I drew the winner of the gift set. 

Congratulations again to John Wharff, owner of one of the coolest male beauty blogs around ‘Mr Wharff’.

Dirty Works Coconut Caress Body Scrub

Arty outside photographs were the order of the day again on Saturday when I likened Dirty Works Coconut Caress Body Scrub to sandpaper - it is a cheap and cheerful product that won’t break the bank but will strip away layers of dead or dying skin.

Structure Paste Flexible Adhesive

The surge in traffic aside, on Thursday I wrote up my thoughts on Structure Paste Flexible Adhesive. Personally I think this is one of the most bizarre posts I’ve ever done as I managed to fuse The Happy Mondays, glue sniffing and references to colleagues at work into what was originally an attempt at a serious review of a product I really was shocked by - for all the right reasons. 

Erasmic Lather Shave Cream and Brush

'Erasmic is orgasmic' was the punt I took when thinking of something funny to say but after my first experience of using a shaving brush instead of being lazy and using gel or foam resulted in some surprising results.

Coming up....

So what does the coming week hold? Well, I attended my first ever blogger event a few weeks ago with the lovely people from Ilumi to sample their new Chinese and Modern Asian range of gluten free meals. 

The night had so much to write about it has actually taken me days to write it up where I'm happy that I haven't missed too much out and where I think I do the products and evening justice.

In addition to this I’ve been trying StoneFish Clay by Fish Soho and trying to resist the temptation to eat Soap and Glory Sugar Crush.

I hope you have enjoyed one or two of my posts over the last week and feel the urge to return to check out my musings over the next seven days.

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Dirty Springwash Shower Gel by Lush

In my youth I had a phrase - “Lush Sucks”, mainly because every conversation I started with a woman would always turn to their products. 

It was a lazy way to shut down that particular line of questioning so that a massively hormonal Stephen could concentrate on other things. I am of course talking about food *cough*, honest.

After overcoming the smell that turns my stomach and growing up (yes, yes, stop laughing, I’ve matured) I ventured into a shop and bought a few products. 

I’ve written before about my love for I Should Coco soap and my quest to get them to start stocking it again but using the bath bombs, the facial scrubs and gels had me converted. The stock phrase from my youth was banished.

Here and now I use Lush products off and on depending upon how I’m feeling and how much time I have on my hands. If you are dropping a couple of quid into the bath you don’t want to be draining the water in minutes, you want a long soak.

Under the microscope today as the title blatantly gives away is Dirty Springwash Shower Gel.

A 250g (yes, based on weight rather than volume) tube will set you back £8.95. Now that isn’t cheap for shower gel in my view, but the proof is in the pudding and all that….

Marketing blurb intermission:

Like a dip in a mountain spring, with spearmint & menthol to make your skin feel cool in a hot shower. Don’t be dirty - get fresh with this tingly, and extremely minty body and hair gel.

As there was a dirty great sticker over the ingredients (mine was made by Dawid like I really care) I couldn’t make out what was in it but boy do you get a huge idea from the fragrance! 

When described as extremely minty that is one hell of an understatement. As soon as the cap is off - BANG, it hits you in the nose like the fist of an angry man after taking a bottle of angry pills on Saint Angry Day.

The spearmint and menthol attack your senses like a battalion of infantry on speed - it’s a lovely smell that gets stronger as soon as it comes into contact with the hot shower water. The fragrance provides a fantastic wake up call first thing in the morning.

The shower gel lathers up really well, it isn’t rich but a small amount of the gel is needed to wash the entire frame of a six foot man - me. 

This is a man’s wash and as the lather runs over the body you can feel the menthol properties, they are right. Even in a warm shower the menthol was making me feel really cool. I can see this being a firm favourite if we have a hot summer this year.

I always feel clean after using this and the spearmint and menthol lingers on the skin - it’s very subtle and doesn’t interfere with aftershaves that are added over the top. A bonus in my book. 

You really won’t be dirty if you use Lush’s Dirty Springwash on a regular basis. It doesn’t dry out the skin and I’ve found that to the touch it is smooth and soft.

The price is a stickler for me - it does last for a long time but it is expensive in my view. I’ll buy again for the summer months but probably go back to a mainstream and cheaper brand in the interim. 

It does what it says on the bottle and you can’t say fairer than that.

RECOMMENDED

It's so good even cats love it....

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Lush I Should Coco

I had been mildly successful in avoiding Lush stores – while being able to smell them a mile away I've never really managed to get over the general sense of revulsion I experience when walking near one. I bit the bullet and actually decided to venture into their Manchester store a couple of years go (looking back, sadly for me it was actually close to a decade ago) – yes the hype I’d read about Lush overcame the rational (well I think I’m rational) thoughts bouncing around my noggin (that’s head for you non-Northern readers).

"I Should Coco" soap bar. I’d read about the "I Should Coco" soap bar online and saw it as too girlie to actually use. I bought a 100g bar and from the first time I used it I was hooked.

The pictures show the bar in all its glory and I won't be going into any amazing description of it. The only thing that you tend to miss nowadays when buying it online like some sort of subversive is the coconut on the top as shown below from my latest eBay purchase. For £1.95 for a bar weighing 100g it was never cheap soap by any stretch of the imagination. 

Layered into three shades of pink the topside of the bar was coated in flakes of coconut making it very easy to grip, even when wet. Basically the soap looked and oozed a very feminine vibe. It’s not something you’d be rushing to take into the showers at the gym.

The bar itself contains creamed coconut along with Orange and Coriander oil which smells almost sickly sweet. I wasn't never sure whether I should be washing with it, or indeed taking a sizeable bite from it. The mild coconut aroma is striking and blends fantastically well with the Orange oils.

After it is immersed in warm water, the aroma from the bar increases but never becomes overpowering on the senses. I'm now down to my last nub of the soap and actually worried about the day it is no more, deceased like a certain Norwegian Blue (if you don't get it reference 'Dead Parrot' by Monty Python).

The beauty of this soap is that that it lathers up superbly, with a little going a very long way. The coconut flakes act as a mild abrasive, exfoliating dead skin as you wash meaning that not only did you not need to use half a bar in the shower, but you also didn't need to use a different product to moisturise after washing.

The final results were and continue to be amazing, my skin felt clean, fresh and above all moisturised. Any traces of body odour after travelling on a packed tube train were removed and the soap left a very subtle but noticeable coconut fragrance that lingered for a few hours. What more could you ask from a soap?

I now regularly use this in the shower and haven't noticed any adverse effects at all. I'm actually quite tight with the use now though! The only problems apart from the actual price is that when used in the bath the soap does fall to pieces rather quickly. It turns the water pink, there is an oily residue around the bath and floating pieces of coconut seem to take an absolute age to remove when getting dried!

Overall I love this product and will not be returning to 90% of the major high street brands.

Using this encouraged me to try more from the Lush range. I’ve been converted – I’m no longer a Lush-o-sceptic!

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

BeautykingUK needs you! 

I'm so in love with this soap that I think we should let Lush know how we feel. 

Show your support for the reintroduction of "I Should Coco" by clicking on the poll on the right hand side of this page - two seconds of your time could sway opinion.

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