Sustainable beauty swaps

Clean up your beauty act this Summer by significantly reducing your bathroom waste

swap Regular make-up wipes for zerowaste alternatives

Lamazuna's zero-waste makeup wipes can be reused more than 300 times, dramatically cutting down the number of single-use wipes being sent to landfill. www.lamazuna.co.uk Made from bamboo and cotton, Ecovibe’s Reusable Makeup Remover Pads come with a wash bag for easy storage. Couple these with the Green Planet Micellar Water for an eco-friendly face washing routine. Both from www.ecovibe.co.uk

swap swap Single-use waxing strips for reusable alternatives

Large Reusable Cleansing Pads – machine-washable, microfibre-free, compostable and made with 70% hemp and 30% cotton with cotton thread Sugar Coated’s washable and reusable at-home waxing strips are made from 100% vegan sugar wax and water. Any leftover sugar syrup or wax is donated to local beekeepers to help provide an alternative source of food for bees in Winter. When it’s too cold outside to find nectar to produce honey, the bees can use sugar syrup as a substitute. www.sugarcoatedhairremoval.com

swap You and your kids’ plastic toothbrushes for bamboo alternatives

Aquafresh has launched a new Bamboo for Kids toothbrush for children 6+ whose bristles are sourced from renewable materials. Its packaging is 100% plastic-free and biodegradable. Currently available from Waitrose.

swap

Seahorse Plankton & Facial Cleansing Konjac Sponge – a 100% compostable, plantbased sponge

swap Plastic-packaged skincare for waste -free beauty bars

swap Abyssinian Oil Konjac Sponge & Cleanser Kit – a 100% compostable, plant-based sponge with microplastic-free cream cleanser to melt makeup away Balade en Provence creates certified vegan and organic, solid beauty bars from the finest ingredients for all the family. It has recently launched the first solid Eye Contour Serum developed and shaped specifically for the delicate contour of your eyes. With regenerating and anti-ageing natural ingredients, its designed to gently condition the skin around the eyes. www.balade-provence.com

swap Plastic shampoo, conditioner and soap bottles for one bar that does it all

Ishga has introduced a luxurious new Shampoo & Body Bar combining its unique seaweed extract with soothing aloe vera and natural spring water. Natural and vegetable-based, it’s free from Sodium Lauryl Sulfate but still develops an excellent lather. It comes in paper packaging too. www.uk.ishga.com You might also like the new Solo Hair, Hand & Body Bar from No Secrets, which contain only a very small amount of water – thereby reducing planet-heating greenhouse gas emissions compared to liquid soaps and shampoos. According to No Secrets, one shampoo soap bar is the equivalent of three bottles of liquid shampoo. www.nosecretsbeauty.com

swap Shopping afresh for refills

Circular beauty brand Circla has rolled out a milkmanstyle refillable beauty product service to help you break up with unnecessary single-use plastic. Just leave your empties on your doorstep and Circla will refill them. Although it’s currently only available in two areas of London, hopefully it will pave the way for similar services elsewhere. www.circla.co.uk Wishaw-based Beauty Kitchen is on a mission to eliminate single-use plastics and packaging for good as part of its Return, Refill, Repeat programme. www.beautykitchen.co.uk

swap Non-degradable plastic make-up for ecoresponsible alternatives

All Tigers is an all-natural, vegan makeup brand that puts the planet first. Not only are its products cruelty-free, the brand gives 1% of all earnings to the Poh Kao Association that helps protect wild tigers in Rajasthan. What’s more, the gorgeous jungle-y packaging is all eco-friendly. www.alltigers.com/en

WHY IT’S TIME TO CLEAN UP OUR MAKE-UP HABITS

Millions of make-up wipes piled as high as the Eiffel Tower are going to landfills every day. We are flushing away or binning an astonishing 11 billion wet wipes every year – which can take up to 100 years to biodegrade. “Make-up wipes are the quickest and cheapest way to remove make-up on the market, but that doesn’t mean they’re the best option for the environment,” says Mark Hall of BusinessWaste. co.uk, which is campaigning for tighter laws to discourage littering and wasteful behaviour and encourage greater recycling. Global sales of all wet wipes are set to hit £16 billion in 2021 but, despite their plush, cotton feel, they contain a mix of plastic fibres such as polyester and polypropylene, which prevents them from biodegrading. They ultimately break down into micro-plastics and smaller fibres which will end up further polluting the oceans and entering the food chain. “With such a high number of wipes being used, there’s a lot of single-use plastic coming into the world,” warns Mark. “The only way to prevent this happening is to stop using them.”