Here at Stylingo we live our life by one simple motto:
‘Cometh the hour, cometh the tan’
Basically, if there’s a high street tanning product out there, we’ve probably tried it.
I’ve always been a fan of proper fake tans over gradual tanners. The Johnsons gradual tanner is, in a word, poo- and I think it might have been this product that first gave fake tan the infamous biscuit smell association. I’ve tried the Dove gradual tanner before with more success, but never found the colour achieved to be quite worth the faff of applying it every day.
So it was with great interest that I read of the Palmers Cocoa Butter Gradual Tanner. I read a few reviews that spoke of its instant dark colour, offered up thanks to the gods of fake tan, and ran immediately to my local Bodycare to pick up a bottle.
My first impression was, of course, that delicious cocoa butter smell. It’s absolutely amazing, and undeniably better than the fake tan smell – though I swear having the smell constantly on me has had a direct impact on the amount of chocolate I’ve been shoving in my face this week. Can I sue the company to make them pay for my lipo?
My next impression was that it didn’t go on as dark as I thought. I’d got the impression from reviews that it went on with an instant bit of colour, and had read some people say that they put it on just before taking blog photos. As I applied my first layer I wondered whether I’d got the wrong product, as it went on the same pale yellow as the normal cocoa butter. If I could go back in time and say one thing to myself at that point, it would be ‘HOLD YOUR HORSES, WEE LASSY’. The colour developed quite quickly and after applying a bit more after a shower later in the day, I saw a nice tan start to develop.
I continued to apply a thin layer near enough every day in preparation for the weekend. And HUZZAH, a tan was achieved! You can have a look at our OOTD post from Saturday to see what a nice shade of orange I had achieved.
It definitely is a bit more intense than I expected from a gradual tanning moisturiser, meaning that I was left with nice orange patches between my fingers after not washing it off thoroughly enough (rookie error, I’m ashamed of myself), so I would be aware of that if you try it for the first time. It also does tend to gather a bit in the areas that a normal fake tan does (ankles, wrists etc ) so you do need a good scrub every couple of days. But generally, I am SO impressed with this product. I’ll carry on using it regularly because I love having a tan, especially one that’s so easy to maintain.
I picked up my bottle from Bodycare for around £3.99 I think, though it can also be purchased from those usual joints of Boots and Superdrug (though for a good couple of quid more – long live Bodycare).
Have any of your tried Palmer’s Cocoa Butter Natural Bronze Gradual Tan? What did you think?
