A new year, a new Project Pan. Project Pan 2022 here we go!
What is a Project Pan?
If you don’t know what a Project Pan is, you can check out my previous post available here. To recap – a Project Pan in it’s most simplistic form is where you set out to “pan” your beauty products – i.e. finish them. It gets its name from the fact that powder beauty products are in a pan, and when you use so much of them that the pan starts to show through, that is referred to as “hitting pan”. My apologies dear reader if I’m teaching you to suck eggs. I have now been doing my beauty Instagram @theartbeaute for just over a year now. And I have discovered that a Project Pan is so much more!! You can do different challenges, like trying to use something a certain number of times, or trying to hit pan on all shades or playing games with the panning project. All these things to keep your panning spirits up! I actually have not partaken in any of these events because I’m really not good at sticking to a schedule. So for me it’s better to have a list of things to tick off. Then my starter nature kicks in, and I go gung ho at ticking them off the list 😁. However, if you are interested in any of these types of pan projects, I will direct you to my friend Lindsay @pacificpanner for some inspiration.
My Project Pan 2022 “To Do List”
The items I chose this year are things that have either languished in my collection, or crucially, things that I LOVE and need to use when they’re at their best, rather than “saving them up” for a special occasion. I’ve just had to throw out one such mask that I saved 😢.
Let’s start with the things I love, because that is always more exciting.
- Ambuja Globetrotter mask* (ad-pr product). This is skin transforming. I will be so so sad when I empty it, but it must be done, because they use non-synthetic materials which means that there is an expiry date.
- Neogen Canadian Clay cleanser*. This is so much fun. It comes with this amazingly soft brush and it’s quite a ritual to use this, so actually I should prioritise using this up now while I have the time to do the whole ritual. I kinda forgot about it because it’s not one of those easy things to just slap on and rinse off.
- Bees Brilliance honey mask. I am torn on this one because I love the product, but I had a bad experience with the brand, which tainted the product. So I cannot vouch for this product in all honesty due to this. Nevertheless it has a whopping 40% concentration of manuka honey, and the other ingredients are not fillers either. You can read my review (prior to bad experience with brand) here.
- Ambuja Kiss My Lips balm (ad-pr product). Ok I’m not sure if I wholeheartedly love this yet, but it’s very nice so let’s just leave it here. It’s slightly languishing because I have another lip balm I’m currently using that I neglected to use as it seemed too expensive to use on a daily basis.
- Ren Skincare Perfect Canvas primer*. It is silicone free and it works. It is hard to find a silicone free primer that works. So by that virtue alone, I love it. But it also has been languishing because honestly, primer is an extra step I don’t feel I need on a daily basis. I went a bit nuts and I have 2 backups on top of this almost full one in the photo. Time to pan at least one of these this year!
- Update (Feb 2022)!
Chanel Water Tint Foundations in Light & Light Medium*. I had to retire the Ilia and the IT Cosmetics as the last straw was a large cystic pimple, which I am not prone to getting. My husband actually was the one who said, “It’s not worth it”. So I re-homed the IT Cosmetics ones to a happy new owner. The Ilia is still in my drawer and maybe I will pull it out again, but likely I’ll try to find someone as pale as me who wants to try it. Instead I’m going to try finishing the Chanel Water Tint Foundations in Light & Light Medium. I don’t have a good colour match in this, and it’s because the undertones are not quite right. However it’s so sheer it’s ok, and mixing Light with Light Medium seems to work well for me. This I LOVE. It’s so good for dehydrated skin, and it feels so super lightweight. In the summer when I bought these, I was wearing them almost non-stop. They don’t seem like much, but they do something magical to the skin, especially when being photographed. I will definitely repurchase these. There is a fragrance but it doesn’t irritate my sensitive skin, and it’s never caused me to have a breakout. I find the best application method is to pump it directly onto my face, then blend it out, rather than pumping onto my hand. Somehow a lot of product gets wasted the latter method. I posted a demo GRWM of this on Instagram, which is saved to my highlights.
Things that are languishing.
- Ilia Super Serum Skin Tint*. Ugh how I wanted to love this. But, I can’t for multiple reasons. It breaks me out. Despite the founder saying that because she struggled with acne, all her products are formulated to not trigger acne. I don’t know what’s in this that is irritating my skin but there you have it. I’ve tried this on multiple occasions and every time, I get a pimple after using. I also don’t think this is a nice or user-friendly product at all. It feels greasy and cloying on the skin, rather than nourishing. It doesn’t set well with powder, so I can’t see how I could wear this outside of a lazy Saturday. I definitely couldn’t wear it to work. Oddly enough it was launched in the summer time, and this is the last formulation I want to put on my skin when I’m hot and sweaty, due to how greasy and cloying it feels. It does give a “dewy” finish but this borders on greasy. And who wants to look like a greasy mess. So again not suitable for the summer. (Please note: I have normal but dehydrated skin). It does have a non-nano mineral sunscreen filter, so from that perspective a plus point. I can’t tell how much I have left, so I can’t really gift it away either. For this product, my goal is to use is as much as I can possibly bear to use it this year – a true effort. Because it breaks me out, I don’t know if I can use it til it’s finished, but we’ll see.
- IT Cosmetics CC+ cream*. I used to love this so much, but it also breaks me out. I think the amount of essential oils in this one perhaps is the culprit but not sure because I can tolerate essential oils in other products. But the main reason why I’m kinda over this is because I’m finding it just too glittery and kind of frosty. This is the glowing finish CC cream, not the regular one. Also I don’t have a good colour match, so I ended up buying Light and then buying Medium to mix the two. But when I saw they came out with Light-Medium, I bought that… only for it not to be the right undertone. What is nice about this product is the coverage you get for something called a CC cream, and if the colour is correct, it looks quite natural and skin-like. And unlike the Ilia one above, this one is actually comfortable to wear. Again, because this product breaks me out, I don’t know if I can use them til they are finished (both the Light & Light-Medium eek).
- Lavoc Derma face mask (ad-pr product). This one is actually quite nice, but I don’t have a need for it in my life, hence why it languished. I’m kind of sad I didn’t use it more regularly because it used to give this really refreshing tingle to the skin, which it no longer does.
- Derma E alkaline overnight treatment*. This was a mistake. It has the oddest texture. There are jelly balls in it, which don’t really burst either, so I don’t get what they are for. I cannot imagine putting this on my face as an overnight treatment to sleep in. It’s just gloopy and sticky and also has quite a strong citrus fragrance which I do not find pleasant. I have been using it with my Foreo UFO. Check out my post for a Foreo UFO hack.
- Lisa Eldridge lip gloss in Blush. This shade, at least in the lipstick form, is one of her best selling shades. But it doesn’t suit me. I am so sad because it sounded like it would be an amazing MLLB colour for me. Unfortunately it’s just a tad too brown for me, but brown as a colour generally doesn’t work on my face with my colouring. Objectively the lip gloss is fab. The colour of the gloss does actually work as an MLLB colour, but it’s on the browner side for me. So instead of letting this expire, I’m just going to wear it around and use it up. Her glosses are nourishing because she uses plant oils and butters in them, so this is as good as using lip balm in the day when I’m lounging around!
- Kosas Color and Light Cream Duo in 8th Muse*. This one was a disappointment. The pigmentation is only so-so, and despite it being marketed as a cool pink (for the blush shade), it’s definitely on the warmer side on me. The highlighter shade is too dark to be a highlighter on me, and while I am pale, but I’m not thaaaat pale. But equally it’s not dark enough to be a suitable highlighter for anyone with a deep skintone. The other major disappointment is that dimethicone is one of the main ingredients, which was surprising given that Kosas market themselves as a clean beauty brand. I don’t have anything against silicone per se. But, I do have an issue that a brand which is marketing themselves as clean is using it in their products, since silicones are not “clean” per se, as they persist in the environment. Also some cyclo-silicones are endocrine disruptors, but that’s a side point. Anyway, the dimethicone does give this product nice slip and will play nicely with standard foundations, as almost all have some sort of silicone in them. Even though I have hit pan on this, I have only used maybe 1/6th of it. Hopefully I can finish it this year.
Tracking Project Pan 2022 Progress
Want to see how things go? Follow me on Instagram @theartbeaute. I will be posting updates & weigh-ins to my stories every month.
Will you be Project Panning this year?
*Indicates affiliate links. Should you choose to purchase using these links, I will make a very small commission which will help me run this blog.
Ad-pr product indicates products sent to me with no obligation to post (Ambuja), or in exchange for an Instagram post and story (Lavoc Derma).
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