If you hadn’t noticed, I’m decently pale with some pretty pink undertones. By no means am I an ivory on the foundation scale, but I definitely don’t tan easily either. Since I prefer to look a little more bronzed babe than porcelain doll, I am no stranger to self-tanning. It may not be everyone’s thing, but I am very pro “people being happy with their self-image and comfortable in their own skin.”
My first interaction with the fake-bake saga was right around the beginning of middle school, when my cousin had this spray Neutrogena stuff. It essentially turned your skin about as yellow-orange as the bottle it came in. I ended up looking like I should hang out in the Florida’s Natural section of the grocery store with the rest of the oranges. While it didn’t take decades to find a good self-tanner that looked reasonable, it did take a while before I found an affordable option that looked good.
When I was in England a couple month’s ago I picked up a bottle of the infamous Cocoa Brown 1 Hour Tan that so many of the Irish bloggers I’d been reading raved about. As luck would have it, right when I was hitting the bottom of the can I’d bought, Cocoa Brown contacted me about sending me some product to coincide with their full launch at Ricky’s NYC. As you can tell, I happily accepted. They were nice enough to send me a bottle of my beloved Express 1 Hour Tan, plus a Tanning Mitt, and a tube of their Gentle Bronze.*
While I already knew I would get great results from the 1 Hour Express Tan due to previous use, I didn’t expect to like their tanning mitt as much as I did. I’ve used ones from Tarte, St Tropez, and Ulta – even though they immensely helped apply tanning products streak free and evenly, I ALWAYS ended up with those tell-tale tanning hands because product leaked through. Maybe it was user error, but applying tanner the way I always do, I did not experience that with this one. No transfer what so ever. Love.
The idea behind the 1 Hour Tan is that you only have to leave it on for an hour to get a light, believable glow. 2 hours gets you a bit darker and 4 hours + gets you the maximum effect. For the above before and after photos, I pretty much just applied the self-tan before bed and put on some loose sweats before washing it off in the morning. For me, it’s the perfect amount of color without looking too orange or unbelievably dark. Extra plus is that it doesn’t smell terrible. These two were definitely clear winners for me.
After my initial forage into not being Oregon pale in the Californian sun, I used the Gentle Bronze gradual tan lotion to maintain my color over the next week or so. This deposited a good amount of color and kept my tan from fading. Overall I liked it, but I’d probably use the mitt to apply the lotion as well since my hands absorbed the color super quickly – though nothing a good little dose of scrub couldn’t fix.
Then the wear test came into play. I didn’t notice any patches, flaking, or rub off onto my towels while the color was slowly fading away. It probably helps that I pat dry and use a heavy duty moisturizer in the mornings, but I was still pretty impressed with how the tan held up.
What are your thoughts on self-tanning? Any go to tips/products that you swear by?
Shop this post: Cocoa Brown 1 Hour Tan Mousse*, Gentle Bronze*, and Tanning Mitt*.
♡Em
*Sponsored post by Cocoa Brown, opinions my own. Read more about my PR/Sponsored posts policy on my Disclosure page.
