DIY Clay Face Mask Recipe
Clay is one of my earliest ingredient loves, and one of my most enduring. Turning clay into a face mask creates a colorful and amusing pore vacuum that cleans your skin, stimulates circulation, boosts healing, and lightly exfoliates your face when you wash it off. I swear by clay, making a point of doing at least one clay mask a week (or more if my skin is being cantankerous) to keep my complexion clean and bright. While the precise recipe I use each week varies, the overall process and effect is the same. I’ll start by hydrating a clay of choice with some liquid, perhaps adding some essential oils. Once I’ve got a wee bowl of creamy paste, I’ll spread it all over my face and wander around my house looking like an escaped spa client for about 15 minutes before rinsing it off and following up with some Essential Argan Serum. Easy (and mildly startling for any housemates or delivery people you may encounter with it on)!
Makes 2 Masks
Ingredients:
- 2 teaspoons (10 mL) warm water or steeped green tea
- 1/2 teaspoon (2.5 mL) raw honey (optional)
- 6 to 10 teaspoons (10 to 15 g) white kaolin clay
- 10 drops essential oil of choice (optional)
- 5 drops liquid carrier oil of choice (jojoba, argan, or grapeseed are all great choices)
Instructions:
- Measure the water or green tea and honey out into a small bowl and whisk them together until the honey has dissolved.
- Next, slowly sprinkle in the clay, a teaspoon at a time, whisking between additions with a tiny wire whisk or small fork. Adding the clay to the water instead of the other way around guarantees a lovely, smooth mask. The amount of clay you need to add will vary from clay to clay, so simply go slowly and see where you end up — you’ll get a feel for it over time.
- Once you’ve added enough clay to have a thick, creamy paste, whisk in the essential oils (if you’re using any) and the carrier oil. Avoid the temptation to add extra oil, as too much will give you a face mask with the consistency of oily putty! It’ll have no interest in staying on your face and will slough off in greasy clods (ick).
- Spread the mask over all your face, avoiding your eyes, mouth, and nose. Be sure to cover any problem areas.
- Let the mask dry for about 15 minutes before washing it off — it should feel tight and look mostly dry. I find starting by soaking a washcloth in warm water and holding it to your face for a few moments to hydrate the mask a bit helps with the washing off process, as does simply doing a mask before taking a shower.
- After rinsing off the mask, moisturize your skin.
Clay Masks Should Be Used Quickly — Immediately, If Possible!
If you don’t use all of your mask at once, consider reducing the recipe in the future. In the meantime, leftovers can be stored for up to 4 days in the fridge with a piece of plastic wrap pressed right down on the surface. You may find you have to add a wee bit more water when it comes time to use your leftovers, and I recommend letting the mask leftovers come to room temperature before using them as spreading cold clay paste on your face is as unpleasant as you’d guess.
More from Make It Up:
Make It Up (Running Press, 2016) by Marie Rayman is a guide for readers interested in creating their own safe, natural, affordable cosmetics using easy to come by ingredients. Following these simple, yet effective recipes readers can forget about drugstore or beauty counter products and instead venture to create exactly what they need right from their own kitchens.
Reprinted with permission from Make It Up © 2016, by Marie Rayma,Running Press
DIY Makeup & Skin Care
Ever think of making your own beauty products? Of creating handmade, high-performance, healthy alternatives to just about every chemical-laden product you currently put on your face and body? It’s easier than you think! Marie Rayma, author, shares the recipes she has developed through years of trial, error, and testing to come up with the very best. This is real makeup and skin care: bright lipsticks, quality mineral powders, long-wearing eyeliners, and masks and cleansers that yield results. Rayma walks you through natural ingredients available online or at health food stores. These awesome oils, butters, clays, and minerals will replace the petroleum products, artificial colors, and lab-created mystery fragrances that have untold effects on our bodies. Products can be tailored for individual needs, from swapping out ingredients not suitable for sensitive skin to whipping up the perfect colors suited for any complexion.With easy-to-follow instruction, Make It Up provides more than 40 essential cosmetics and skin care projects so you can make just what you want, when you need it.Order from the Mother Earth Living Store or by calling 800-456-6018.