First impression: Kruidvat Originals

Affordable skincare difficult to find? I think so. If there is one thing I like to invest in a little bit it’s my skincare. Good skincare will do wonders and I have been getting a lot of compliments lately about the way my skin looks because I finally found a routine that works. It’s extensive and definitely not cheap if you add up all the prices of all the individual products. So you can understand my intrigue when I found Kruidvat renewed their Originals skincare line. It is supposed to be affordable (no product here cost more than 2 euros) and it should work as well.

Kruidvat Originals
Cucumber Cleansing Milk, Rosewater Toner, Almond Oil Facial Oil,
Tea Tree Skin Treatment Oil, Apricot Scrub Cream

I haven’t had the chance to fully work these products into my routine yet. That is why today’s blog post will focus on my first impression of these products. How does my sensitive and allergy prone skin fare when using these products for the first time? And what are my thoughts based on swatching them out? At only 2 euros a pop, I was curious enough to see whether it could work for me. Add on the fact that Kruidvat has a loyalty card and you could use your points towards these products when I picked these up and I ended up paying a mere 1 euro per product. These are my first impressions.

Kruidvat Originals Komkommermelk (Cucumber  Cleansing Milk)

This cleanser promises to take of your make up and should be suitable for all skin types. It should feel refreshing on the skin and and I think you can see why I wanted to pick up these products right? It’s the packaging. All the bottles and jars are made out of glass and that instantly gives a more luxurious feel to the products. It’s very Victorian apothecary style and I hope to give these a good clean when I’m done with them so I can reuse them for trying my hand at some DIY beauty products.

What made me want to pick up this Cleansing Milk in particular is the ingredient list. The main ingredients are water, glycerin and… almond oil. There is also some alcohol in here, but this is the good kind and you can also see some shea butter and cucumber extract. For 2 euros, I was impressed. This product does contain some perfume though and it’s definitely not an organic or all natural skincare product, but it also doesn’t promise that in the first place.

Another good thing about this product is the pump. It closes shut by twisting the pump in one direction and opens by twisting it into another. Clever and hygienic, but not the best for travel.

The milk itself is quite thick and firm. It feels very creamy and it spreads out quite nicely. I put some of this on a cotton pad and cleansed my face twice with the milk. This took off all my face make up really well. I also used it to remove my eye make up and while it gets the job done, I was afraid the milk would get into my eyes, so I wouldn’t use it for that purpose again as I prefer a separate eye make up remover in the first place.

One thing you should know is while this product feels nice texture wise and feels most definitely refreshing on the skin it is heavily fragranced. The cucumber smell is a nice one, but I haven’t used a skincare product that is this heavily scented in a long time. Another point I have to mention is how red my skin looked after the first cleanse. That is usually not a good sign, but that could also be from using the cotton pad with this product. It might be better to gently massage this onto your face with your fingers and then use a cotton pad or damp cloth to remove the product.

Kruidvat Originals Rozenwater (Rosewater Toner)

Now I don’t know about you, but I love myself some toner. I like how it finishes off my skincare routine and it makes my skin feel ready for the next step which is to apply my serum and moisturizer. A rose water toner sounded right up my street and again I like the glass bottle which comes with a handy screw on cap.

Unfortunately the ingredients on this aren’t as good as the Cucumber Cleansing Milk. High up the list is Alcohol Denat. which is the drying out your skin kind. It does also contain some actual rose extract luckily enough and also contains perfume, which is all the way at the end of the list for this one.

Again, like the cleansing milk, the Rosewater Toner is heavily fragranced. If you dislike rose scents, you will not enjoy this product as it has a pretty heavy rose scent to it. I also feel this didn’t do much for my skin. As a clarifying toner I can see it’s use, but I would have to pair it with far gentler products to make it work. I felt this made my skin feel dry and tight.

Kruidvat Originals Behandelingsolie Tea Tree (Tea Tree Skin Treatment Oil)

This is an oldie but a goodie in my beauty routine. I didn’t include this in my skincare routine post as I don’t use it enough to claim it is part of my routine. What it is? A tea tree oil that is great at combating spots. I usually use this if I feel a particularly nasty break out coming on and if I use it diligently a few nights in a row, most white heads are dealt with swiftly and unnoticeably.

This product probably has the best ingredient list in the punch. It contains some Glyceride, but right the second ingredient is already the oil. There is no added perfume and it also contains camomile extracts. All in all an ingredient list that looks promising. It does smell a bit funky though. If you’ve never smelt tea tree before, it will definitely take some getting used to.

I usually apply one or two drops of this onto a breakout, be it a white head or a red head that is bursting to become a white head and leave it on over night. It is best applied to cleansed skin and I apply my moisturizer on top as usual. What this does is dry out the spot and it will help it to heal and disappear faster.

Kruidvat Originals Huidolie Almond (Almond Oil Facial Oil)

A facial oil for only 2 euros? This sounded almost too good to be true. Facial oils are usually incredibly expensive and o I knew I had to try this. Because if this works, it could be a great budget steal.

The ingredient list looks great. Both almond and macadamia oils are high up on the list. There are also very few ingredients in this facial oil, but also note how this again has added perfume. It does smell nice and less overpowering than for instance the rose toner.

This product is a straight up oil. I haven’t had a chance to try it overnight yet, but the way this felt on my hand and after initial application (I am typing this blog after just having tried some of these products for the first time, yep this blog is that fresh!) it feels nice. It does need some time to be absorbed by my skin though, but eventually it does. My skin feels soft and I think that this is a great product for an overnight treatment.

Kruidvat Originals Scrubcrème (Apricot Scrub Cream)

This isn’t a body scrub! No it’s a facial scrub. This again promises to thoroughly cleanse your skin, but in a mild way. This is of course a scrub so this isn’t something I would use on a very regular basis. Hence this being the only product I haven’t tried on my face yet. Let me explain why.

The ingredient list is quite long. Lots of abracadabra that I don’t understand but also almond seed powder, which I think might be the scrubbing particles in the scrub. What I like is how the jar comes nicely sealed. I wished this would come in a tube however, as I like using facial scrubs in the shower mostly and jars are just messy and inconvenient in that way.

The product itself looks nice, smells nice (again there’s that perfume!) and feels like an intense scrub. But here’s why I haven’t use it yet: the scrub feels a tad too intense. To the point where the scrubby particles are kind of painful, already on the back of my hand. And now that I have read the Pixiwoo book, I am even more apprehensive about putting this on my face. They claim that scrubs with natural particles could damage the skin as they aren’t as smooth as synthetic scrubs. I will certainly try this some time, but I figured that for now this may not be the product for me.

What is your opinion about affordable skincare?