A solid cleansing balm made from shea and cocoa butters with jojoba oil and pink clay. It removes make-up and cleanses in one step, and it comes with no bottle, no pump and no plastic. Fragrance-free, dermatologically tested, 100% ingredients of natural origin, handmade in Provence. It smells faintly of chocolate because it contains cocoa butter, not because anything has been added.
Why an oil cleanser works — and it is not obvious
Foaming cleansers struggle with make-up because most make-up is designed not to come off in water. Mascara, foundation, sunscreen and long-wear products are built on oils, waxes and silicones.
Like dissolves like. An oil-based cleanser dissolves those materials on contact, which is why a balm lifts a full face of make-up in a way a foaming wash cannot — and why it does it without the stripping, tight, squeaky feeling that comes from surfactants removing your own skin lipids along with the make-up.
Being solid rather than a liquid or a jar of balm is simply the packaging solved: no bottle, no pump, no plastic, and nothing to leak in a bag.
How to use it — the part people get wrong
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Dry hands, dry face. This is the step everyone skips. Water on the skin first stops the balm from making contact with the make-up, and the whole thing slides around uselessly.
- Warm the bar between your fingers and massage it over your face, including the eyes, for a good thirty to sixty seconds. Take your time — the massage is doing the work.
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Then add a little warm water and keep massaging. Many balms emulsify into a milk at this point; if this one does not, simply wipe it away.
- Remove with a warm, damp flannel or reusable cotton pad, and rinse.
- If you wear heavy make-up or sunscreen, follow with your usual gentle cleanser — the classic double cleanse. The balm's job is to dissolve; the second wash clears the residue.
On eyes: it is fragrance-free and dermatologically tested and should not sting, but it will blur your vision briefly, as any oil does. Keep your eyes closed while you massage and rinse thoroughly. Take contact lenses out first.
Making it last — the one real weakness of a solid bar
Keep it dry between uses. A butter-based bar left sitting in a puddle will go soft, slump and eventually turn mushy, and a wet bar in a warm bathroom is also somewhere bacteria are happy. Stand it on a draining soap dish with air around it, or keep it in a tin with the lid off between uses. Do not leave it in the shower.
In a Porto summer it may soften in a warm bathroom; that is the nature of shea and cocoa butter and it firms up again. If it has genuinely melted, the fridge will rescue it.
Practical notes
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Patch test on the inner arm before first use.
- Shea butter is derived from the nut of the shea tree. Reactions are very rare because the butter is almost entirely fat rather than protein, but if you have a severe tree nut allergy, read the ingredient list and check with your doctor.
- Oil cleansers leave a film on cloths. Wash flannels and reusable pads hot and separately from anything delicate.
- Note the period-after-opening symbol — this is a natural-ingredient product, not one built to last for years.