During winter the days are shorter and the nights are darker meaning we don’t see much sunlight in the colder months of the year. And living in England, you don’t really get much to begin with! So us English roses have to fake it until we make it. This post is going to be all about how to prepare your skin before you apply fake tan. I’m a huge advocate of fake tan and would choose to fake it over going on a sunbed any day. The only time I do use sun beds is just before going on holiday and that is to give me a better chance of not burning when I get there. Other than that, when I want a bit of colour, I use a fake tan, preferably one that develops over a few hours rather than an instant tan as we all know what happens as soon as we hit a patch of rain… dalmation anyone?

 

So first of all, I step in a nice hot shower and make sure I have an exfoliating scrub/ body polish and a sponge to hand. I have been loving the Strawberry Fields body polish from Bomb Cosmetics recently as it smells soooo good and it’s not uncomfortable like a lot of body scrubs are, which I love. To use it on my skin, I literally just dip the sponge straight into the product, give it a twist and lightly scrub my skin in circular motions. This is to take away any dead skin and make sure the tan you use, applies as smoothly as possible. If you don’t exfoliate before applying fake tan, the tan can cling to patches of dry skin, making those areas appear darker and not blended in.

“Shower body polish with pure patchouli and ylang ylang essential oils”

When I’m out of the shower and dried off, I then like to apply a body lotion as it’s really important to moisturise any dry skin before you fake tan for the reasons above. The one I like to use at the moment is from the Botanics range at Boots because it really feels like its hydrating my skin and it smells really fresh, like it’s actually doing my skin good. The exfoliation and moisturising will work hand in hand to ensure your fake tan applies smoothly, blends easily and lasts as long as you want. Just a tip, I like to do this the night before I apply any tan to give the moisturiser time to sink into my skin. If you’re showering in the morning and applying tan at night, that will be absolutely fine! The moisturiser can act as a barrier for the tan if you apply it too soon after moisturising so the tan will become ineffective.

This is just my routine and since doing this, I’ve never had an issue with the way my tan applies and I find that my tan lasts a lot longer when I do these steps. The tan I’m using at the moment is Utan which I’ve only just started using to expect to see a review of this in a few days time!

Thanks for reading

Bea x