This year, I’ve decided I want to try some more primers. My face isn’t overly oily and make up staying on my face isn’t usually something I have to deal with, but in the summer time, when temperatures rise, my skin gets oilier and it’s good to have a product to help combat the shine and staying power of my make up. I use eyeshadow primer every single day already, so why not on my face? So when I was offered to try the multi-use Pure Magnesium Skin Balm by Zechsal, that could also work as a primer, I was all ears.
Zechsal Pure Magnesium Skin Balm
My main reason for wanting to try this product is the fact that this is an all natural, silicone free product that cannot only be used as a primer, but it can also help with eliminating zits and redness in the skin. While I have few zits, my skin can be pretty red too, so I was curious to see what it would do. A 50 ml bottle retails for €14.50 and can be bought at Vitaminstore or online at Zechsal.eu.
The Ingredients
The bottle isn’t too fancy: just a plain and simple product. I like that since this means it is all about the product: no need to distract the customer with fancy packaging and a product that doesn’t work very well.
With only 6 ingredients, this is about as basic as it get. The main ingredients is water, but the rest of this product is based around the infamous milk of magnesia. Originally created to deal with stomach acid reflux, someone once put it on a pimple and it disappeared magically overnight. But since milk of magnesia is not formulated for usage on the skin, this could lead to problems. Enter Zechsal’s Pure Magnesium Skin Balm, which is milk of magnesia, but reformulated for use on the skin.
The Swatch
When you pour this onto your hand, you will find this is a very watery, thin consistency. Blending it out is easy, but it also kind of separates on the skin immediately. This is no issue however. The consistency is so thin that there are no problems to work this into the skin. It is absorbed pretty much immediately. It has a little slip at first, but that disappears quickly. Since one of the ingredients is tea tree oil, the product has that very distinct smell as well. This may or may not be your favorite smell in the world so bear that in mind.
The Application
Before – After (applied to left side of the face)
The main claims of this product is that it will combat the oils in your skin as well as disinfect and stimulate the skin. This causes pimples to disappear, redness to lessen and shine to be and issue of the past. Because of its anti-shine properties this should work great under make up as well.
I decided in the latter instance. I applied the product on one half of my face with my fingers and wore my usual make up on top to see what this would do for my skin. I am not super shiny at the beginning of the day, but you can still see a little less shine on my nose. Moreover, my skin looks a little less red on the left than on the right. Great first impression!
The Test
Freshly applied make up – After a full day of wear (close to 12 hours)
As you know I have some pretty long days. I get up at 6, do my make up around 7 and am usually not home until 7 PM. The day I tried this out was such a day and it was a hot one as well. I also did 4 hours of teaching, walked to catch a train and went about business as usual.
I loved how my make up applied over the Zechsal Skin Balm in the morning. My make up went on flawlessly, perhaps even a little bit better than usual. My main issue with this product didn’t show up until the end of the day. If you look closely at the picture above, one side of my face looks a little darker than the other.
Left side of my face (with Skin Balm)
Right side of my face (no Skin Balm)
While it all started out so well in the morning, I was shocked to find that one half of my face simply looked orange by the end of the day. I took pictures to show you what happened. As you can see very clearly, one half of my face turned straight up orange, while the other half of my face, still looks fine. You can clearly see where I applied the product and I ended up with the much dreaded ‘face mask’ effect after a full day of wear.
The Conclusion
Despite the Zechsal Pure Magnesium Skin Balm doing a good job initially, I would not recommend this product. There is something in this product that doesn’t gel well with the chemical make up of my skin or the oils in my skin. As my make up wore throughout the day, some sort of chemical reaction took place which caused my foundation to oxidize quite dramatically, while this is usually not the case.
I don’t even have super oily skin and while my make up stayed on, I didn’t really notice much of a difference in shine and staying power when I don’t use this product. But what is the main dealbreaker here is the fact that it made me look like an oompa-loompa, which is just not a great look. I will continue to keep this with my skincare products though, because I like to keep great products on hand for when I do get the occasional zit.
What is your favorite primer?
3 responses to “Zechsal Pure Magnesium Skin Balm”
That looks so good!
Too bad about the oxidization. Could possibly be the magnesium hydroxide, which is used often as an antacid, which means it’s alkaline. It could be interacting with the acidity of your skin to cause the discolouration.
That was my guess as well yeah. It must be something in this product that reacts to my skin’s natural makeup.