Simone France

Hello darlings. Let’s pretend for a moment, that I am a very fashionable beauty blogger, shall we? I know, it will be a stretch for you (especially after yesterday’s 80s fest), but just try. After all, I did own a pair of tapered zipper ankle acid washed jeans (with little bows over the zipper) in 1989. Surely that gives me some kind of street cred?

The lovely people over at Simone France must have been confused when they offered me a trial of their skin care products in exchange for a review. Afterall, people are always telling me I look just like Whoorl or Metalia (ha ha, no they aren’t). Or maybe they just figured my face might need some TLC after I scraped all the paint and Play-Doh out from under my fingernails.

Confusion or no, I was intrigued. So I said, “HIT ME BABY!” and the PR rep politely ignored that and asked me to skip on over to the skin care analysis form and fill it out. I don’t know if you know this about me, but I love filling out forms. The only thing that would have been better would be if it had been an old fashioned paper form with carbon copies and a really lovely ball point pen.

Okay, so that would have been better for weirdos like me, not the masses.

Now before we get in over our heads here, I’ll just take this moment to that I’ve been blessed with really good skin naturally (dodges rotten tomatoes). I attribute this to my mother’s amazing genes. If she couldn’t give me glossy ringlets as she did my other sisters, at least I got her skin. I only have a few problem areas:

• I’m prone to blackheads around my nose. Which I’m fond of digging at which causes problems with flakiness and fingernail wounds. Ahem. I can’t help it.
• I can get what we fondly call ‘undergrounders’ (deep cystic acne) along my jaw line and chin, especially around my cycle time, even though I’m no longer having periods — though this area was much worse prior to my endometrial ablation, and clears up even more if I’m off sugar and wheat completely.
• My skin runs on the dry side, so it can get flaky if I’m picking and look a bit dull.

My typical skin care routine includes:

• Being incredibly lazy and never ever removing makeup before bed. Instead, scrubbing it off in the shower or over the sink the next morning with Cetaphil. I like Cetaphil because it doesn’t sting when it gets in your eyes. (Or, if we’re standing on the dock of truth, here, wipe the undereye smears and slap some more on.)
• When I’m paying better attention to myself, I use the Extra Virgin Olive Oil method (EVOO). Even if I’m not paying better attention to myself, I’ll use this as my daily moisturizer after giving my face a quick once over in the shower with (gasp) soap.

I think I could hear the collective sharp intake of breath from here when the Simone France peeps read that I used soap. On my face. But hey, sometimes I’m lucky if I get my hair washed… speaking of, I think I’m on day three today. Calgon, take me away.

Okay so here’s what they sent:

Ingredients for The Sandwich (Refining Scrub, French Formula, and Simone France Soap) Rich Milk (I like this a lot), Refreshing Toner, Disposable Cleaning Cloths, and a little sample of Lovely Glow.

It comes with some instructions, and I’ll be honest, for someone like me who is disorganized and always on the run, the idea of a skin care routine that is serious about its steps was a bit intimidating, but I girded up my loins and gave it a good go. I’ve been using the product as directed for two weeks. However! Since I am a bit of a frazzled dingbat, I completely forget to do The Sandwich until 2pm. And often fall asleep before remembering to do the evening routine. But I’ve been pretty regular for me.

This is The Sandwich:

It’s a little unconventional, but I like the results. First you apply the moisturizer (I didn’t love my Lovely Glow sample, so I’ve been using French Formula – they have other types, French Formula is pretty heavy and a bit greasy feeling, but my skin drinks it up). Then over the moisturizer you apply the Refining Scrub. Wetting your fingers with warm water, you scrub that around in the moisturizer. My blackheads? ARE BANISHED with this method.

After that, you use the Simone France soap and make a lather and scrub that all around in the scrub and moisturizer. They want you to remove it all with a Cleansing Cloth, but I just skip right ahead to splashing my face with warm water. The directions say to splash 15 times with warm, and then 15 splashes with cool. Hardee, har, har. I do just enough warm to get all the grit off, and then a couple cool splashes to wake me up.

After that, apply more moisturizer. Now, because the French Formula is a bit heavy and greasy, I go eat breakfast or get dressed or whatever before I apply makeup.

Here’s what you need for the evening routine:

This one doesn’t have as many steps. You smear Rich Milk (or Light Milk depending on skin type) all over, I use a good dollop:

It takes eye make up off very nicely. I haven’t had any sting my eyes but I don’t know if it’s as eye-friendly as Cetaphil. (I’m trying not to laugh in this photo, how do beauty bloggers not crack up completely?)

I do use one of the Disposable Cleaning Cloths to remove the Rich Milk. I get it wet with warm water and get all the mascara off. The cloths are nice and soft, but the cloth diaper user in me doesn’t like the disposableness of them.

(That was day old makeup from Monday that I removed at 3pm on Tuesday… the Simone France people are weeping, can you hear them?)

Oh and look, fresh as a daisy:

Next is the Refreshing Toner, which I have no idea as to its purpose. To close up pores, I think? I haven’t touched toner since I was in 7th grade and everyone was using Sea Breeze (though I didn’t know why, then either, I was just a sheep.).

After that I dot on some French Formula and nearly die laughing trying to get a picture in the mirror. This documentation process is a little silly. I think I have lotion all over my new camera.

And then we go into the kitchen for some better light so you can see my skin after two weeks of this (plus The Sandwich — which I DID have photos of, but accidentally deleted and couldn’t get it together to retake them all). Feast your eyes on my loveliness (SNORT):

Maybe I ought to try some of their wrinkle cream… but I’m kid of proud of my lines. Weird I know, but they match my gray hair!

All squidginess aside over the idea of me demonstrating beauty products, I like the stuff. I didn’t love the sample of Lovely Glow they sent me (it made my skin look a little dull and I didn’t like the feel), but I quite like everything else. It’s all a bit spendy though, so when my freebies have run out I might splurge for more French Formula and the Refining Scrub… and maybe the Rich Milk. But Olive Oil, the occasional Biore nose strip*, and Cetaphil** seems to work just fine too.

*Oh my WORD, people posted photos on Amazon of their used strips. That is DISGUSTING, even for me. GAG.

**I use the original Cetaphil, you know, the one Dooce once said looked like semen? It looks like they might have changed the formula, I don’t know what the newer stuff is like.

My frugal side will begrudgingly admit that my skin does seem much glowier than it does with Biore and Cetaphil, however some of that might be that I’ve been forcing myself to pay more regular attention to my skin in order to give these products the review they deserve.

If you’re intrigued, I’d recommend you fill out the skin care analysis form, and wait for their input. They’ll help you put together something that works for your skin. When you’re ready to buy use coupon code FT108 for 10% off your order. And then I want you try to take pictures of your own mug in a dirty bathroom mirror with product all over your fingers.

(Oops, this was supposed to post tomorrow morning. Oh well, two for one today!)