Morning runs, not-so-early-bird traffic, Monday meetings, freezing air-conditioners, lunch hour rush, afternoon Skype calls, Crossfit, drinks with Thato from accounting and boom all of a sudden it’s the end of the day and you have accumulated little wealth and much exhaustion. Your skin has accumulated some stress too. The sunscreen in the morning (never skip sunscreen – ever), the dryness of the air-conditioner, the external environmental factors and natural sebum and sweat excreted by the skin on a daily basis. Take it all off. Clinique’s Take The Day Off cleansing balm is a foundational part of my skincare routine. This lightweight, emulsifying balm is an effective makeup/sunscreen remover and an excellent pre-cleansing step.
I’ve been using this balm for over a year and a half, my skin visibly benefits from double-cleansing so it’s definitely one of the best purchases I’ve made. Double-cleansing is the practice of using an oil-cleanser to first remove all of the day’s servings off of your face before you go in with a foaming cleanser. The logic behind it is that the best thing to remove oil is… Oil. So the oil cleanser acts as a magnet to pull out all the “debris” from your skin so that your foam cleanser becomes more effective. Interestingly, I’ve found that my skin is less dry AND less oily when I double-cleanse. I have oily/combination skin with cheeks that are prone to dryness, this product meets all my needs, especially because I use two finger-lengths of sunscreen every morning. That much sunscreen will not be cleansed as effectively by a foaming cleanser on its own.
Every evening before I shower, I take a fingertip-sized amount of the Clinique Take The Day Off cleansing balm and I rub it in between my palms until it turns into a light oil. I rub it against my dry skin for 60 seconds before rinsing it off. It emulsifies, so I don’t need to worry about an oily residue on my face before going in with my facial cleansing gel from Dermalogica for another 60 seconds.
Once a week, I’ll do a “deep cleanse” where I rub the cleansing balm into my face for 12 to 15 minutes. This is to allow all of the deep routed ‘gunk’ to come out of my skin. Usually, I’ll have little black oil plugs on my palms when I’m done, signifying a successful “deep cleanse”. The black dots I’ve circled in purple below are the oil plugs, they feel like grit building up as you rub. I learned this process from my favourite skincare internet guide, LA Beautyologist. She has a video on it and if you search for “The Golden Rx” on Youtube, you’ll find her video on double-cleansing very insightful.
While I love this product and can usually last about 4 months before needing to buy a new one, it is not cheap. It retails for R390.00, I haven’t tried any commercial alternatives so I can’t advise on those. However, whenever I run out and am unable to buy it immediately, I use hemp seed oil to double cleanse and then wipe it off since it doesn’t emulsify. While hemp seed oil also works well for me, I prefer the Clinique balm because the rinsing off minimises admin as well as any tugging on the skin. K-beauty trends have really popularised double-cleansing, and I can see why. My skin glows brighter and feels smoother to the touch. It also responds better to products I put on my face at night. Overall, I would give this product an 8/10. It’s definitely worth the purchase.
