Sephora Collection Dry Clean: Solid Brush Cleaner

My beloved makeup brushes get a lot of use, so I'm always on the look out for new easy ways to clean them.  Clean brushes mean less breakouts for me, because trust me when I say that any well loved brush gets dirty Christina Aguilera style, but not in a sexy way.

Here's Sephora's Solid Brush Cleaner.  It's $14 for the solid soap and a hot pink textured silicone pad. The solid soap has argan oil, which is great because as you're washing your brushes you'll also want to condition the bristles.  This is going to keep them flexible and soft.  The scent is sort of tropical and nutty.  It's not brutally strong, very soft and pleasant.

The directions found on the back say to wet the soap, put your brush on it and rinse your brush.  The pink pad is for "deep cleaning." I say go big or go home, so I used both.  I know, I live dangerously.

The first thing I did was sprinkle some water on the solid soap, just a bit.  That didn't do much as far as a lather or cause any product to come away from the brush. Disappointing, but I decided more water was the fix.  I decided to wet my brush AND add more water to the soap.

Slightly better when use with the pink pad. I then started to think about the fact that I really didn't want the solid soap to start meting in a pool of water like any bar of soap would.  So I got creative.  I added some lukewarm water to the cap that was housing the pink pad.  About halfway full so that when I dipped the brush it wouldn't over flow. It still did over flow but...

Look at all that! Gross. So here's the system that ended up working best for me.

1)Wet the brush, in the cap is fine but adding a bit of water to the bristles is fine too.

2)Swipe the brush along the soap, just enough to get a bit on it.

3)Now swirl your brush on the wet pink pad. Watch all that gross dirt and feel both disgusted and fascinated.

4)Rinse the brush and gently reshape with you hands.

5)Rinse the pink pad. 

This way most of the dirt ends up on the pink pad and not causing the solid soap to get too muddy.  

This is a very easy way to keep your brushes clean.  It's recommended that you clean your brushes every 6 weeks. I, however, use many of my brushes everyday.  So I feel better cleaning them every 4 weeks.  I've also seen my brushes last longer because of a good daily brush cleaning spray.  I can say that neither is enough on it's own, though.  Just like a good skincare regimen, regular brush cleaning can make a big difference for your skin.