As my hair’s grown out, I’ve had to readjust many parts of my old haircare routine. Case in point: my old shampoo and conditioner were just not cutting it. They worked fine for shorter hair, but with longer hair kept leaving me with greasy roots and dried out ends, for some reason.
I’ve heard so many great things about Lush, I decided to give them a try. In particular, I was curious about their solid shampoos. I ordered Trichomania, which is suggested for curly hair, and Jungle, the only solid conditioner available. The price isn’t bad for the quality, and the shipping was very fast. As soon as I got them, I stuck them in tupperware containers – I would definitely recommend doing so with solid shampoos/conditioners because otherwise you will end up with quite the mess in your bathroom!
Anyways, I received them in July. For reference, I have fine curly/wavy hair that’s easily weighed down. Here’s my thoughts a month on:
Trichomania smells amazing – it’s a light coconut scent, and it’s definitely not drying at all. My hair feels clean but is still soft. It’s almost too conditioning combined with Jungle (more on that in a second). It has almost entirely lost its bar shape by now, so like I said, some kind of container is pretty much a must. One curious thing is that I notice a lot of blue on my hands after I wash my hair, so I figured it would strip the color much faster than the shampoo I had been using, but it doesn’t at all. Go figure.
Jungle took some tweaking to get just right. In its unaltered state, I found it really hard to get enough off to adequately condition my hair – I would have to reach outside the shower and dry my hands off, then try and pinch off a piece of conditioner, emulsify it between my hands, and finger-comb it through my hair. My hair didn’t feel conditioned enough just using it while in the shower, so I started using a tiny bit as a leave in conditioner – but that tended to weigh my hair down a bit more than I liked; my second-day hair looked great (I shampoo my hair every other day and on the off-days just pull my hair back) but my first-day hair, not so much.
I looked at some of the reviews on the Lush website and saw that other people had had similar problems, with both application and the quality of conditioning; so I tinkered with it a bit. I cut the bar into chunks as suggested by one reviewer and poured water over them, just enough water to cover the chunks. I didn’t want to just water it down, so I put a tiny bit of jojoba oil (probably 1/4 tsp) and olive oil (3-4 drops) in the mix as well; then stuck it in the microwave until it was melted. I stirred it well and then let it solidify again – the result is much more buttery and easier to handle in the shower. And instead of applying it twice, I just put a small amount in my hair as a leave in conditioner right before I get out of the shower. It works fabulously this way; my hair is soft and shiny but not weighed down at all!
The smell might be off-putting to some. I think Lush may have changed the scent at some point, because several of the reviews comment on a “fruit loop” smell, but the bar I got smells like freshly cut grass and evergreen trees, not fruity at all. It’s pretty strongly scented in the shower but it doesn’t linger on my hair much, or at least not that I can tell.
Overall, I had a really positive experience with Lush & the products I ordered; I would definitely recommend checking out their haircare products!
