SMART Skin Perfecting Mask
by Grand Central Beauty
Testing, Reviewing, and Blogging
Price: $75 for 4 treatments
Last month I picked out my 6 items for my kit on
Beauty Army. One of the items that I chose was the Grand Central Mask kit. I wasn't really too thrilled about another mask, but I was curious about the packaging. There were several items in the circular packaging and I wanted to see what it was. I didn't even cared what it did I just wanted it.
You can get this kit on
Beauty Army here:
http://bit.ly/IsftBk
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Finally I decided I might as well try it out and see how the quality is. Honestly I don't think I would pay for this since it's utterly expensive, but the great thing about sampling services is that I can try new beauty luxury for little or nothing of the cost.
When I first read the directions I was a bit confused, but after reading it a few more times I understood. Here's the direction as on the pamphlet (all rights belong to www.grandcentralbeauty.com, no copy right intended):
1. PREP
Keep hair away from face, pull back long hair with headband. Clean and dry your face with your favorite cleanser. Take all contents out of CONVERTIBLE CONTAINER to use MIXING TUBE or TRAVEL MIXING DISH
2. MIX
Combine the following in Mixing Tube or Travel Mixing Dish
-Add 1 Capsule Active Mask Powder
-Add 1 Capsule Cool Tap Water
-Add 1 Vial Intensive Booster
Mix contents vigorously with Spatula until texture is smooth and creamy
3. APPLY
Once the mask is mixed, use immediately. Apply and Layer entire mix generously onto clean face, avoiding hairlines.
4. LET DRY
Allow 15 minutes for mask to dry. Remove immediately; mask may still feel moist to the touch.
5. PEEL OFF
Loosen outer edges all around the face by pushing lightly and lifting with fingertips. Rinse remaining residue if necessary. Lightly pat dry.
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The actual instructions on the pamphlet had pro tips that I didn't include, but you can find that on the grand central beauty website.
I didn't do a video on it, I don't have time or energy today. I did take a whole bunch of photos just to blog about it though.
Click on any photo to enlarge!
Everything in the kit:
1 8g Active Mask Powder Capsule
1 5ml Intensive Booster Vial
1 Spatula
1 Mixing Tub + Dish
Instruction booklet
The pink powder has shimmer in it, which I thought was cute, but not sure if it's practical.
The instruction said to pure one capsule in. A capsule is one jar approximately.
Next is to get a capsule full of water and add it into the mixture like so.
The final ingredient is the intensive booster. That bottle is one vial. So we add all of that in and mix with the spatula provided.
And it should look goopy like this after you mix it in.
Before I applied the mask, I washed my face with cleanser.
The instruction said to apply on large areas first on the face. I started with my forehead and cheeks.
So this is what it looks like after I've applied it all over. The mask started to dry and tightened on the edges while I was working on smaller areas such as my nose and around my lip.
There was a lot of mixture left! I felt so bad that all that will go to waste. For me, that's another application for a later use. But you can't use this again. It hardened pretty quickly so I had to toss it.
While I was waiting for the mask to dry within the 15 minutes time frame, my face felt cool and crackly. Not to mention itchy underneath. That's such a weird feeling and I've never had this feeling before with any other masks. I also felt that the longer I waited the tighter my whole face was. I couldn't move my lips or smile....just blink!
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Okay, after waiting a little over 15 mins, this is what it looks like. The white part you see are just the part where it dried up. They're also the thinly layered. The part where it's still pink is the thickest.
So lifting it gently on the outer edges, I'm just peeling back slowly. It felt so cooling and refreshed.
And this is what's left after peeling it all off.
My face after peeling off the mask. There were some flakes left so I did wash my face with just water to clean it off. I guess my face looks brighter. It felt cleaner too.
I'm still not sure how I feel about this mask. I don't think it made me feel any different. I've used some other masks where I felt that all of my dead skins were lifted off and my face felt so clean and oil free. This mask only gave me half of that feeling.
I don't think I would buy this mask because of the price. If it were not as expensive, maybe I would get it. I'm not really big on masks. I do use them about 3-4 times a month to exfoliate and refresh my skin, but I don't believe in them much. I do like the peeling masks though, because they do take dirt and dead skin off.
Overall, I think someone that loves facials would enjoy this. It didn't hurt when I peeled this off and it was very cooling. The mask very tightening though, maybe that's good for someone with wrinkle and pore concerns.
