hair Archives - Page 2 of 3 - Curiously Carmen

TRESemmé Reverse Beauty-Full Volume system

February 29, 2016

Happy Leap Day!!! This is the first time a post has ever been published on February 29th here on Curiously Carmen 🙂 The next time this happens will be in 4 years, I wonder where Curiously Carmen will be in 2020!

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I’ve used TRESemmé for many years back in high school. It was all my mom ever bought because it was pretty cheap for a large bottle, and we love to save money wherever we can! I ended up using the same line for so many years that eventually my hair built tolerance to it, and found my hair got oily faster. I was also getting tired of the smell after so long, and finally ended up buying my own drugstore shampoo instead.

TRESemmé has recently launched a new line of hair products called the Beauty-Full Volume system. This is my first time coming back to TRESemmé after a couple years, even though I have used it occasionally when I ran out of my usual shampoo and used my mom’s. I have been trying out this new line for a bit over a week now, and here is what I thought of it!

What sets this line apart from other products is that you are supposed to use the conditioner first, and then shampoo! Following the proper steps will lead to what TRESemmé describes as ‘bouncy, touchable hair’.
Step 1) TRESemmé Beauty-Full Volume Pre-Wash Conditioner: As mentioned above, you are supposed to condition your hair first. I liked that this came in a pump bottle, as it was easy to dispense the product. It has a clear but slightly thick consistency to it.

After using 2-3 pumps and leaving this on for one minute as you would with any conditioner, you rinse it off. Since I have an oily hair type, I only used this starting from the middle of my hair, down to the tips. As I washed the conditioner off, I instantly felt my hair transform into something more soft and ‘flowing’, if that makes any sense.

Step 2) TRESemmé Beauty-Full Volume Shampoo: Following is the shampoo! I wished that the shampoo came with a pump as well, but no big deal. I squirted some product into my hand first, about the size of a Canadian quarter. Then, I lathered it into my hair.

I love the smell of this shampoo! It smells very refreshing, and reminds me of green apple. Not too feminine, so males in the household could use this as well. I found that it lathered quite a bit, which made me feel like it did a great job in cleaning.
Step 3) TRESemmé Beauty-Full Volume Hair Maximizer: After getting out of the shower, apply the maximizer to damp hair, then blow dry. I normally don’t put product in my hair after I wash it, but this would be good on special occasions where I want my hair to look a bit nicer!

I found that the maximizer further softened my hair and it also tamed flyaways.

Overall, I really like TRESemmé’s new line and could see myself continuing to use it. I love the fresh scent, and how volumized, clean and soft my hair looks!

Even after twelve hours of wash, I can still smell the shampoo on my hair and my hair feels nice and light, but volumized at the same time. My friend also commented that my hair looked more volumized too!

Yay!

Thanks for reading!

Carmen

Roger & Gallet Boutique Opening

December 18, 2015

A couple weeks ago, I was invited to the opening of the Roger & Gallet boutique. Roger & Gallet is a classic Paris-based company that has been around since 1862. This boutique marks the launch of their first store in Canada. The boutique is located inside The Bay by Pacific Center, in the beauty department. I loved how bright and happy everything was inside the store. Seriously, their decor, design, and branding is on point.
Apart from all the lovely and glorious scents, one thing that was new to me was the way that customers are able to sample the scents. Instead of spraying the scent on a sample sheet, you pick up the glass funnel to inhale the scent. By using the glass funnel, the perfume is desaturated, which helps to smell the entire aroma and scent.

My favourite scent that day was red ginger, pictured on the bottom left. Although the smell of ginger is usually associated with sickness (ginger tea for colds work wonders, everyone) or food, their red ginger scent also included sweet pomegranate, making it not as spicy smelling.
I love soap walls, or soap in general. What a beautiful and colourful soap wall they had! Each colour is a different scent.

The 100g soaps are $10 CAD each, and come with a travel box as well. Roger & Gallet soaps are 100% vegetable based and enriched with essential oils.

More products! I brought home the Fleur de Figuier ($40 CAD) scented hair/body oil on the bottom. It smelled amazing and consisted of grape, pomegranate, black currant, apricot and sweet almond oils.

I used it as a body moisturizer and conditioner for the ends of my hair. I could smell the product the whole evening, and it left a wonderful scent in my bedroom afterwards.
Soft pinks, so girly! This was an assortment of body lotions, soap, shower gel, and perfume. They do not carry any makeup products for now, rather focusing on body care products.
To end the post, here is a photo of a cute little wall decoration they have. Also, let’s take a moment to appreciate their wallpaper.

I had a lovely evening learning about the products! They are a lovely gift option, as the packaging is great while the products & scents are even better. You can also check out the products online at The Bay.

Thanks for reading!

Carmen

Birchbox PARLOR Launch Party – Event Recap

October 16, 2015

This week, I was invited to a launch party for Birchbox’s exclusive brand, PARLOR!.PARLOR is a new line of hair care products created by celebrity hair stylist, Jeff Chastain. The event was held at a beautiful boutique hair salon in one of the historic buildings in Gastown, House of Blond.

An event is not complete without delicious food, and boy was I glad to snack on these after a one hour commute straight from work and not having dinner yet. I know this is a beauty post, but I am part food blogger so I definitely have to comment on the catering! There was a great selection of meat, cheese, and fruit.

After some introductions from the ladies who hosted this event – Birchbox, Devon PR, and House of Blond – Sarah, the owner of the salon, led us guests through the new products.

The new products were set up in a few spaces throughout the studio, and the brick wall and greenery provided a beautiful backdrop for Instagram/blog photos!
The products in this picture are the same as the two above, but I thought I would include this picture as well! Pictured here is the new smoothing blowout spray and moisturizing sea salt spray.

One of my favourite things about this line is how simple it is. When Jeff creating the line, he envisioned it to be a simple line, thus eliminating many different steps and maximizing the use of each product.

The line also has a gender neutral scent, so you’re able to use these products without worrying about smelling too girly or manly. It smells very clean, and is composed of ripe peach, fresh cut grass, and wood. The line is also free or paraben, sulfate, and colour. There are also no animal products in it so it is vegan friendly as well.

After talking about the four new products, we each sat in Sarah’s chair and received mini hair makeovers. We told her what we loved about our hair, and what concerns we had. When it was my turn, I told her that my main hair concern was that my hair tends to get oily pretty fast.

Sarah recommended the new sea salt spray for my hair type. She sprayed some in my roots (which smells wonderful, by the way!) and worked her magic on me. My hair was transformed into something that was more textured and voluminous. I was quite shocked at how big of a difference the sea salt spray made in my hair.
I only hope that I can recreate the voluminous look at home, too! I love how my bangs look more textured, and I have that natural, beach hair look even in the chillier weather here in Vancouver.

I also got to meet some other beauty bloggers as well, after only interacting on Instagram! That really made my night as it’s always nice to finally be able to chat in person, and meet new beauty bloggers to follow.

Each of us received full size samples of the new PARLOR line, as well as October’s Birchbox. I’m really excited to try out the products on my hair and write a detailed review on the products.

Thanks for reading!

-Carmen

Degrease Shampoo by Maple Holistics

May 27, 2015

Hey everyone!

This month, I was approached by a US based company, Maple Holistics, to review their hair care products. After reading up on the company and browsing through the products, I chose to order one of their best seller shampoos, the Degrease!

Ever since puberty, my hair type has been oily. I wash my hair each day because it becomes greasy, and feels unbearably gross if I don’t wash it. I know that some people are able to ignore that feeling, and I’ve tried to but I can’t! =(

Yes, I know that everyone says you shouldn’t wash your hair every single day as it will damage/dry/thin your hair… but when you have zero tolerance for an itchy and greasy scalp, plus oily hair to begin with – it has to be taken care of!

Plus, I have such an excess of oil in my hair so I don’t think that by washing it everyday, I am ‘drying’ my scalp out as there is SO MUCH oil =P I’m really jealous of those people who can go for days, even a WEEK without washing their hair, or simply using dry shampoo/baby powder to clean their hair – I could never do that.

With all that said, I was honestly a bit hesitant at how well this shampoo would work. I’ve tried so many different shampoos catered towards ‘oily hair’, yet I don’t really think have made a difference! =(

The ingredients in this shampoo consist of lemon, cypress, rosemary and basil, which help relieve oily, greasy hair and itchy scalp. Degrease works to remove excess perspiration without absorbing hair moisture, all while contributing natural compounds known to assist in re-balancing sebum secretion levels.

I was very impressed with their shipping times, my shampoo arrived within three days of me placing my order! Funny story, I woke up that morning with extra oily hair (bleh) and really wanted to give my hair a good wash. I decided to check on my bunny very quickly first, and noticed that I had a package delivered! Talk about perfect timing!
I was very excited to try this product because I have yet to find something that has worked for my oily hair. The instructions told me to use a quarter sized amount, then work it in your hair and wait a few minutes for the product to settle in before rinsing.

This shampoo has a very herbal and earthy scent – do not expect a perfume-y scent like the ones from Pantene or Herbal Essences (sigh, those smell so good haha!) as this product does not include any fragrance. The scent of this product reminded me a lot of the aromatherapy stores, which I personally love!

Immediately after rinsing, my hair felt very clean. I definitely felt that all the excess oils had been stripped away. I decided to test this product out and see how long it would take before my hair felt oily and gross. (Usually, that is under 24 hours – the oils in my hair work too fast!)
…..Which is why I was so shocked when I woke up the next morning, with my hair still feeling as clean and fresh as it did yesterday! That has never happened to me before and I seriously couldn’t believe it!

I went through the whole next day without my hair feeling oily or greasy – and that was seriously a miracle.

This was the first time that I purposely chose not to wash my hair the next day. I usually don’t have a choice as my hair gets so oily – and that was an absolutely liberating feeling. You may think I’m being dramatic, but when you have been dealing with oily, greasy hair your whole life, you will know what I mean.

Those with non-oily hair, appreciate little moments in life like this and don’t take it for granted! With this shampoo, I am able to wash my hair every other day without it feeling heavy or greasy – a possibility I never knew would exist knowing how much I hate that oily hair feeling.
Here is a picture of my hair in the sun! I brought the shampoo with me on vacation, as I knew that Kelowna would be hot (which equals to more sweat & oil production). I like how my hair looked in this picture, it has a nice healthy shine without looking too thick and greasy =)

I also raved to this product to the boyfriend and told him to try it since he suffers from oily hair as well. He was also equally impressed with the product and doesn’t his hair look nice and clean as well in the picture? =)

The Degrease shampoo is seriously great. I have never tried any other shampoo that has worked this well for my oily hair. If you suffer from excessively oily hair, I highly recommend trying this product. It has made my days so much easier now that I don’t have to worry about having my hair bother me the entire day.

You can buy this product on Amazon.

If you have oily hair, what are some tips/tricks that you use to keep your hair as clean as possible?

Thanks for reading!

-Carmen

Product provided by Maple Holistics for review. Opinions are my own =)

Trader Joes Refresh Citrus Hair & Body Wash

May 24, 2014

I love Trader Joes food products. A few months ago, I went through a phase of going crazy over their food products, because it was so good and (mostly) healthy!

Unfortunately, the closest Trader Joes to where I live is in the country next to me, so I can’t simply stop by when I have free time. Anyways, the last time I went to Trader Joes a few months ago, I was strolling down the aisles and saw that they sold body wash. Needless to say, curiosity got the best of me and I ended up buying it. I think it was around $5-6 USD.

The description on the label made it sound super awesome, so I was very excited. “The pure aroma of sweet orange, succulent grapefruit, tangy tangerine, and luscious lemon refreshes the body and smoothes the mind.” is what the first line read.

However, I think they over-exaggerated with the description. The scent of the body wash isn’t that strong, contrary to what it says on their label. After taking a shower, I was a bit disappointed because I couldn’t smell much of the body wash on my skin.
Since I was disappointed with what little scent it had, I started to neglect it and left it sitting in my shower over the past months. I recently decided to give it another chance, which is why I am writing this review now. It says that you can also use this as shampoo, so I decided to give it a try. As a shampoo, it worked a lot better and formed a great lather, even with a small amount.

But I would suggest using a lot of conditioner since this doesn’t really moisturize your hair. I felt that my hair was drier than normal afterwards (didn’t use conditioner to test this out).
Anyway, needless to say, this body wash is pretty average, so don’t let their description deceive you, like what it did to me. I think if I didn’t read the description, I would have liked it a lot more, but I did have high expectations for this product. I should also mention that there are a lot of quality ingredients in this body wash, if you look at the picture above. (botannical water extracts of chamomile, ginseng, lemon grass, sage, essential grapefruit/tangerine oil, vitamin b5, vitamin c, vitamin e, vitamin a) ^ I’m not sure if I would buy it again.

Pros:
-Good price
-Has a light citrus scent
-A tiny amount produces a lot of lather
-Quality ingredients, not just your usual body wash ingredients
-Cruelty free, no animal testing, biodegradable bottle
-Durable bottle

Cons:
-Can’t smell the scent before purchasing; bottle is sealed
-Description is deceiving
-Says it is “aroma-therapeutic” but didn’t have any effect on me

What else did I get at Trader Joes? On a side note, if anyone reading this is going down to the states and wants to get me some TJ cookie butter, let me know and I’ll pay you back 🙂 Hope you enjoyed the review!

-Carmen