Obsessed with Asian/Korean stuff - taking your skincare to level 3!

[FrugalFashionista]

Asian and Korean skincare products are big thing right now. We love them!
Tailor your multistep skincare routine here! (or see this pic)

Some of our favorite products so far...
Biore UV Aqua Rich Watery Essence SPF 50 Sunscreen
Missha Magic Cushion BB Cream #21
Lioele Dollish Veil Vita in Purple
Holika Holika Petit Jelly BB Cream
CosRx Returning A-sol
Scinic Propolis Serum
Mizon Hyaluronic Acid Serum
Missha Time Revolution Night Repair Science Activator Ampoule
Missha Super Aqua Cell Renew Snail products & trial kit
Mizon Snail Repair Cream
Mizon Returning Starfish Cream
Mizon Good Night White Sleep Mask
Innisfree Wine Jelly Sleeping Pack
My Beauty Diary Imperial Birds Nest and Hyaluronic Sheet Masks
Innisfree Trouble Care Sheet Masks
Innisfree Real Squeeze Sheet Masks
Tony Moly Avocado Mask
Nexcare Acne Patches

Our favorite sellers:
UK-based Bits and Bobs of Beauty
EU-based Missha.ee, Missha.de
Korean Innisfree
On eBay f2plus1, sing-sing girl, Iamlove, blueprint21
Orders from outside the EU: £15 or less are VAT free!

Blogs and other resources
Reddit Asian Beauty, Fifty Shades of Snail, Snow White & Asian Pear, Skin & Tonics
more resources here...
Vol 2 of this thread here and Vol 1 of here

Please come and share your questions, experiences, links and best shopping tips!

Help! What order do I use these?
Moisturiser, primer, Biore factor 50, BB cream/foundation

ilove years of sleep deprivation with many kids has completely broken my ability to get a restful night's sleep! I too am now pale looking and my dark hollows stand out.
I am trying haloxyl, but tbh I can't see any difference.
My skin looks fab but my under eyes not so much. The only thing that is helping is the sulwhasoo eye cream. My eyes might be hollow but at least the wrinkles have all but gone.

I take loads of supplements too, get yourself some!

Wow, I woke up to amazing skin! The glow is back, the texture is much finer now, and I did not react to snail bee serum!

GoodAs, Moisturiser, biore, primer, bb, I think

Yay! Hada Labo is here, and my Dragon Bloody Essence from Beautynetkorea! Plus a couple of samples from BNK of Skin Food Gold Caviar Collagen Double Eye Serum (upper eye).

Not sure which to try first! Probably the HL, since I have waited what feels like forever for that!

The hada labo is really lovely lucysmam. I'm really tempted to try their foaming cleanser.

Which snail bee did you tryfrugal? I Am still yet to use my benton samples. Tbh I'm quite scared after all the contamination horror stories. Maybe I should patch test too.

buttons which sulawhasoo are you using? I have 30 samples of ginseng eye cream on my watch list. Where did you buy yours?

Scrambled thanks for that I will buy some b vits and make sure I taken them.

Speaking of which I saw hyaluronic acid supplements yesterday being advertised for skin. Anyone know about this?

And lastly, if anyone can recommend a wonderful under eye concealer I'd live you for ever. Currently use Benefit erase paste but it settles into my lives and looks quite dry. Maybe once I've started using sulawhasoo.,,

Sleep I'm using the Benton snail bee. Despite being stuck at customs for more than a month (perhaps the warehouses here are cool-storage?) it looks and smells fine. I am keeping it in the fridge though after opening it. Will try it on my full face today.

DD2 got really excited about one of my new Kiko lipsticks and smeared about 1cm on herself, the mirror, the bathroom countertop and herself. She chose a particularly longwearing one, cleaning everything up is a bit challenging But I realized she is just imitating me and my beauty obsession and perhaps felt a touch left out so tried to compensated by painting their fingernails - a pretty blue red for her and gold for her big sister. They are off to a playdate so that we can continue the clearout.

We have tackled the cellar today. The move is proceeding really well, I am really pleased. I feared the cellar but it's just a few baby items, a ton of empty cardboard boxes and a boxful of my old clothes. DH has gotten rid of our garden furniture and the plastic Christmas tree.

Does anyone on here use the Hada Labo foaming cleanser? Is it wonderful and can anyone confirm that it does not contain SLS? If not how does it foam? (goes for all other asian foaming cleansers...)

Sorry ilove, I don't have it. I have no idea how it foams either...I did google but didn't come up with much - mainly recommendations for sls free cleansers.

How much of the Hada Labo should I be using? I think just a few drops since it's quite liquid? If so the bottle will last forever!

Ilove, Hada Labo has a US website which has a list of the ingredients on it here.

As far as I can see it doesn't contain SLS, however it does contain Butylene Glycol, quite near the top of the list (given an Acne irritant score of 1 on Cosdna). I'm not too sure how much good hyaluronic acid will do in a face wash either, but a lot of K-beauty bloggers seem to use it and love it.

Not sure what causes it to foam though, sorry.

Thank you for your help Phantomquartz! I agree, they're vastly overpriced and completely impractical... and that's probably why I want them . I shall wait till I see BIL's gf again and see if I can work out a way to ask her to pick me up some pricey/harder to find stuff when she's next in SE Asia (she's there a lot for work) without sounding like a grabby bitch. Failing that, I shall insist to DH that we need a holiday in S Korea. Which probably won't work because he dislikes anything warmer than the balmy climes of N Norfolk...

Phantomquartz what have you done to me?!

Swooon!

What's the link Scrambled? It didn't work (probably a good thing since I shop by name or looks mostly )

Whew! I've done a mega clearout in my beauty product drawers. My stash has really gone down this year but there are still lots of products to use up. I'm such a hoarder

Sleep I use the Hada Labo Gokujyun lotion (great stuff) but have not tried their cleanser. It is on a lot of HG lists though! I also don't get on with SLS at all.

I used pH 5.5 cleansers in the past for many years but unfortunately they did not help my acne. I am a bit tired of experimenting atm and have gone back to my trusty black nigella soap (or homemade castile mini soaps when I am travelling) after the CosRx disaster. I found a Japanese study on the long-term effects of soap use, it seemed to be no more drying than other alternatives, so I am going to continue. Definitely many cleanser samples I have tried recently have felt much harsher.

Please skip the rest of the message if soaps bore you... I want to bang on about them a bit because they are my most frugal skincare secret

Castile soap and nigella soap face seem to magically tone down my breakouts! My skin is normal/dry but not atopic exzema dry, so soaps seem to suit me really well - but please do not try them if your skin is very dry or exczema prone as they will be too drying. My skin adapted to daily soap use in about a week. I only use very simple handmade soaps, and prefer them unperfumed. When I learned soap-making years ago, I learned that there is a way to make them a bit more conditioning by upping the oil-lye ratio by about 5%. Because oils are saponified by lye, they change their form: I usually avoid natural oils but can tolerate them in soaps. Soap making is totally fascinating, you can use coconut oil or olive oil or bog standard canola from your cupboard, and get superb results with just four or five basic ingredients! There must be an inner hippie in me because I am thrilled by this... The downside is that a batch of soap lasts forever Someone on MN mentioned a few years ago that Black African Soap is good for acne-prone skin. I found a Middle Eastern variant in a local erboristeria (here) and it has become my favorite anti-acne weapon. It's made with just olive oil, nigella (black cumin) oil, lye and salt, so super simple!

Someone asked what your magic soap was while you were away Frugal! I think it was Scrambled.

Ooh the Ladurees are pretty amazing! My DDs love cute and princessy cosmetics, Ladurees and the House of Whoo are straight out of fairy tales!
We also love the totally impractical cat lipsticks and yesterday we found this via LunaTu!

Sorry about the long soap rant! I'm just so happy to be breakout free again! Acid pads are great too... Ten more minutes and the waiting time is over and I can do a sheet mask!

Scrambled I recently lost a holiday vote, we will have much of a summer this year so will spend New Year in Dubai. Wonder whether any Korean cosmetics chains have landed there yet? I think I read this on Reddit but you can soon buy Missha in Bed, Bath & Beyond in the US! That is super mainstream! Wish it was as easy in Europe...

lucysmam not sure whether you can see pictures but this was what was behind the link! Gorgeous Laduree stuff!

I can on mobile! Think I need a lottery win so I can have all the pretty things

snail's first sheet mask pinched from reddit. Thought it'd make you all smile

And...after reading this 50 shades blog post, I now want to try a bubble mask but am a bit at the prices I found on ebay. It looks fun though & the popping bubbles sound good!

ilovetosleep I use the foaming (pump) Hada Labo. You can see me raving about it up thread.

It comes out as a very fluffy, airy, odourless foam and a little goes a long way. I use it as my second cleanser in the shower, sometimes alone, others with my Missha konjac white clay sponge.

Love it and will repurchase - it leaves your skin very clean, without the squeak, draggy feeling you get with most foam cleansers.

Oooh, liking the Hada Labo...I feel all smooth! Must stop touching now You really do only need a teeny bit don't you!? I didn't expect three drops to do, but they did.

I also want teddy bear sunscreen!

Frugal, as our resident Italian expert, could you tell me if you know anything about L'Erbolario? There's one on my high street , it looks intriguing but for some reason I've never gone in!

I doubt they'd do the black nigella soap though, they look far too posh

My fingers are twitching over that cat blusher/highlighter! Drat it, too much loveliness.

Lucysmam, it's good stuff isn't it? I want the foaming cleanser too but I've got perfectly decent stuff to use up before I can buy it . Also, we're making progress on the house move so am putting a stop on all new purchases till I have our completion/move date.

Okay Lucysmam I thought I'd seen everything but wow!
A sunscreen that says Mommy!

Scrambled funnily enough I just binned an L'Erbolario mini kit today during my mega clearout. They are everywhere here, very cute botanic packaging, cheap floral perfumes, but - a bit meh. If you like Yves Rocher or L'Occitane and The Body Shop, you will also like them. All of them can occasionally have standout stuff but to get to it there are countless too-dark foundations and shrill room spray type perfumes. Kiko gets my vote