Australian Purifying Pink Clay Mask
Ingredients overview
Highlights
Key Ingredients
Other Ingredients
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Ingredient name | what-it-does | irr., com. | ID-Rating |
---|---|---|---|
Aqua | solvent | ||
Kaolin | colorant, abrasive/scrub | 0, 0 | goodie |
Quartz | abrasive/scrub | ||
Sodium Bentonite | viscosity controlling | 0, 0 | goodie |
Quartz | abrasive/scrub | ||
Glyceryl Caprylate | preservative | ||
Glyceryl Undecylenate | emollient, emulsifying | ||
Hamamelis Virginiana (Witch Hazel) Leaf Extract | soothing, antimicrobial/antibacterial | goodie | |
Terminalia Ferdinandiana (Kakadu) Fruit Extract | antioxidant, skin brightening | ||
Chamomilla Recutita (Chamomile) Flower Extract | soothing, antioxidant | 0, 0 | goodie |
Pelargonium Capitatum (Rose) Leaf Extract | |||
Citrus Reticulata Peel (Mandarin) Oil | perfuming | icky | |
Organic Aloe Vera Powder | soothing, moisturizer/humectant | goodie | |
Red Iron Oxide | colorant | 0, 0 |
Dotted Zebra Australian Purifying Pink Clay MaskIngredients explained
Good old water, aka H2O. The most common skincare ingredient of all. You can usually find it right in the very first spot of the ingredient list, meaning it’s the biggest thing out of all the stuff that makes up the product.
It’s mainly a solvent for ingredients that do not like to dissolve in oils but rather in water.
Once inside the skin, it hydrates, but not from the outside - putting pure water on the skin (hello long baths!) is drying.
One more thing: the water used in cosmetics is purified and deionized (it means that almost all of the mineral ions inside it is removed). Like this, the products can stay more stable over time.
Kaolin is a type of clay or to be precise, a naturally occurring hydrous aluminum silicate. When you hear clay, you probably think of a muddy greenish-black mess, but that one is bentonite, and this one is a fine, white powder. It is so white that it's also often used, in small amounts, as a helper ingredient to give opacity and whiteness to the cosmetic formulas.
As a clay, it's absorbent and can suck up excess sebum and gunk from your skin, but less so than the more aggressive bentonite. As it's less absorbent, it's also less drying and gentler on the skin, so it's ideal for dry and sensitive skin types.
When it comes to oil-absorbing clay masks, bentonite will probably be one of the first ingredients on the INCI list. Technically bentonite clay is mostly montmorillonite + something else, and thanks to the something else bit, bentonite comes in different types and colors.
The color depends on the mineral content of the clay: white bentonite is rich in boron and fluoride, yellow is rich in manganese and zinc, green is rich in copper, zinc, and manganese and the pink clay is rich in boron.
No matter the color, bentonite is excellent at absorbing things: it can suck up the sebum and gunk from the skin and make it instantly smooth and matte. Not only that, but bentonite has a negative ionic charge and thus can attract things with a positive charge. Things with a positive charge include bad bacteria and toxins and bentonite clay masks can help to clear those out of the skin and pores (btw, bentonite is edible and has the same detoxifying effect internally).
Thanks to bentonite's effect against bad bacteria and pathogens, there is also some research showing that bentonite can help to calm skin infections, soothe skin allergies and might work for skin conditions like psoriasis and eczema.
On the other hand, the downside of bentonite being such a good absorbent is that it can suck up more than the excess sebum and used too often, it can easily dry out the skin. So use it for good measure, and never forget to moisturize afterwards.
A 100% plant derived, natural (Ecocert approved) multi-functional ingredient that has emollient and moisturizing properties, can work as a co-emulsifier (meaning that next to other emulsifiers it can help water and oil to mix) and even more importantly has a strong antimicrobial activity.
Thanks to this last thing, it allows a lower percentage of traditional preservative or it might even be able to completely replace them.
We don't have description for this ingredient yet.
The extract created from the leaves of the hazelnut-bush-like-magic-tree, commonly called Witch Hazel. We have gone into detail about Witch Hazel in cosmetic products here (it's astringent, soothing, antioxidant and antibacterial), but the important part to know about the leaves is that they contain much, much less active components than the bark. In fact, it contains hardly any tannins (only 0.04%) and the most active component in the leaves is the antibacterial gallic acid.
Too many tannins can be very astringent and irritating to the skin, so this is not necessarily a bad thing. Even the small amount of active components in the leaves seem to give it nice soothing, astringent, and antibacterial properties.
We don't have description for this ingredient yet.
Chamomile probably needs no introduction as it's one of the most widely used medicinal herbs. You probably drink it regularly as a nice, calming cup of tea and it's also a regular on skincare ingredient lists.
Cosmetic companies use it mainly for its anti-inflammatory properties. It contains the terpenoids chamazulene and bisabolol both of which show great anti-inflammatory action in animal studies. On top of that chamomile also has some antioxidant activity (thanks to some other active ingredients called matricine, apigenin and luteolin).
Though chamomile is usually a goodie for the skin, it's also not uncommon to have an allergic reaction to it.
We don't have description for this ingredient yet.
The essential oil coming from the rind of the mandarin orange also called tangerine. In general, the main component of citrus peel oils is limonene (80-97%), a super common fragrant ingredient that makes everything smell nice (but counts as a frequent skin sensitizer).
Other than that, citrus peel also contains the problematic compound called furanocoumarin that makes them mildly phototoxic. In general, the sweeter the citrus, the less it contains, so tangerine peel contains less of it than some other citruses (like bergamot or lime), but still, be careful with it especially if it is in a product for daytime use.
A spray-dried or freeze-dried version of Aloe Leaf Juice. The point of both drying methods is to make water evaporate from the juice and leave just the "useful" components behind.
So the aloe powder has similar soothing, emollient and moisturizing properties as the juice. You can read a bit more about the juice here.
Red Iron Oxide is the super common pigment that gives the familiar, "rust" red color. It is also the one that gives the pink tones in your foundation. Chemically speaking, it is iron III oxide (Fe2O3).
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what‑it‑does | solvent |
what‑it‑does | colorant | abrasive/scrub |
irritancy, com. | 0, 0 |
what‑it‑does | abrasive/scrub |
what‑it‑does | viscosity controlling |
irritancy, com. | 0, 0 |
what‑it‑does | abrasive/scrub |
what‑it‑does | preservative |
what‑it‑does | emollient | emulsifying |
what‑it‑does | soothing | antimicrobial/antibacterial |
what‑it‑does | antioxidant | skin brightening |
what‑it‑does | soothing | antioxidant |
irritancy, com. | 0, 0 |
what‑it‑does | perfuming |
what‑it‑does | soothing | moisturizer/humectant |
what‑it‑does | colorant |
irritancy, com. | 0, 0 |