Hey, Your Makeup Brushes Are Causing Your Skin To Break Out

If you inhabit the beauty space for long enough, you’ll realise that where makeup brushes are concerned, there’s one for everything. Foundation? Blush? Contouring? It’s easy to amass a small collection to rotate between, and even easier to forget about cleaning them. Nevermind the question of keeping all those brushes in storage.

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Which is why we’ve come to today’s topic: your makeup brushes are (probably) causing your skin to break out. And you may not even realise how bad it could get. Uh oh.

Makeup brushes are commonly broken down into two different varieties: natural, and synthetic. Natural brushes as the name would imply, uses animal fibers in its bristles. These animal fibers are usually derived from fox, squirrel, goat, or sable fur. Synthetic brushes on the other hand, simply use man-made artificial fibers such as nylon in the bristles.

Source: Pimmebliss

In terms of application and use, there are pros and cons to both types of brushes. However, in the case of cleaning them, synthetic brushes are far easier to maintain as compared to their natural counterparts. This is due to the fact that natural fibers can absorb a lot of product during each application in their cuticles. While that’s great for coverage, it’s not so great for hygiene.

Source: Beautymone

Not cleaning your makeup brushes can lead to a buildup of product, and constant exposure to the open air may eventually cause these buildups to decay. This creates a haven for bacteria and even mould, which will be transferred to your skin every time you apply makeup. That’s day-old foundation, dirt, and dust going right back into your pores. Ewww.

As you can imagine, using dirty brushes often will result in increased instances of acne and pimples on your face. And that’s only the start. If you use eyeshadow brushes often, not washing them (or sharing your brushes), can lead to conjunctivitis aka pink eye.

Dirty brushes can also irritate your skin due to their increased stiffness, which may further aggravate preexisting pimples.

So how often do you need to clean your makeup brushes? Makeup guru and household name Bobbi Brown recommends doing a deep clean of all your makeup brushes at least once a week.

Source: Buzzfeed

Deep cleaning your brush is quite an involved process, and requires you to wash your brush with warm water, a small amount of either dishwashing detergent or soap, before rinsing clean. Be sure that you’re washing as far into the root of the bristles as possible, dislodging any amount of makeup residue that may be hiding within.

Once you’ve washed your brushes clean, always hang them out to dry before keeping them in storage to prevent bacterial or fungal growth! Hang the brushes bristle-end down to encourage any excess water to drip away from your brush, instead of gathering at the insides of your bristles.

 

Also read: This Label On Your Skincare Products Can Save You From Acne Breakouts

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