Gadget Review: Foreo Luna
When the Sephora sale was almost over, I had a mini panic attack thinking I should get something that was pricey. You know...to make the sale really worth it...because my 10 billion online orders already placed weren't enough?!!
That's how I ended up buying the Foreo Luna.
***Purchased by me. Affiliate links included.
Foreo Luna for Combination Skin - $199 @ Sephora, ULTA, Barneys, Neiman Marcus and on the Foreo site
Normally I would have tried the one for Sensitive Skin, but it was OOS during the sale so I chose the one for Combination Skin.
The Luna comes with an antimicrobial pouch, charger, warranty card and instructions. It's important to note this isn't supposed to be use to remove makeup, unlike the Clarisonic. You should remove makeup first, then use this with your follow up cleanser. It's also not recommended to use this with "clay-based, silicone-based, or grainy cleansers, exfoliators, or scrubs".
Here are the instructions. I found the pauses that tell you when to move to the next section are little hard to recognize, especially if you use this in the shower. By now I've gotten the feel for what 15 seconds is and end up moving to the next section before it pauses.
Here's a better shot of the button that turns the Luna on/off. The -/+ signs decrease/increase the strength of the pulsations. It's recommended to use a lower pulsations when you use it for the anti-aging.
The Combination Skin vs. other Lunas have different silicone 'bristle' sizes and placements. Here's a closeup of the silicone on this one.
At first I used this for a solid couple of weeks, both night and day. Here's what I found during that time:
* Holds a charge amazingly well. Even after 2 weeks I didn't need to charge it. The Foreo site says it can be used 450x's on a full charge.
* Dries quickly and cleaning it is a breeze. Very travel friendly since it holds a charge so well and doesn't take up much space (it's about the size of my palm).
* The silicone feels even more gentle on my skin than my baby wash cloths and muslin cloths. Feel so gentle, in fact, that I kept wondering if it was doing anything for my skin.
* I found it a little tough to navigate around my nose and also where my nose goes flat, between my eyes (trying to get into that little dip is very difficult!!). And over my cheekbones. Basically anywhere that's not flat.
* I have to keep wetting it during the process, otherwise it feels like the cleanser kind of dries out. Unlike the Clarisonic or other similar gadgets with nylon bristles, there's nothing for the water to really hang onto so it just gets dry.
* I had watched a few 'how to use' videos and they all said to use bigger kind of sweeping motions. Then Rachel (Thank you!!!) said she uses hers with tiny circles - that works SO much better!
* Absolutely no irritation, even with night & day use...but I have read other reviews that said otherwise. (***Edit: Should be noted here that the Clarisonic absolutely tore up my skin, and it hasn't been the same since.***)
And here's the anti-aging side. During the 2 weeks of night/day use I didn't notice a change in fine lines around my eyes. Even now after a month I don't notice a difference, though my use has dropped. In the Luna's defense, I don't have a ton of fine lines to combat and I do use a lot of other things to help...so...there's that. At this point, I feel like any anti-aging with this device is something I wouldn't notice for a long time. I may not even notice it at all...might just be something preventative that you'd never notice unless you had a clone that didn't use it and you could say, oh wow, yeah, that Luna works! Or, oh wow, that Luna doesn't make a difference. Or if you are someone who doesn't use much anti-aging anything you might notice?
After the couple of weeks of full time use, that 1 minute of Luna use started getting annoying. So I then went back to using my cloths and alternating with the Luna. Because...you know...that otherwise eats into my pinning time!! Plus when I use the cloths, I use them as I rinse my cleanser off so they are definitely less time consuming.
Then, since I really wasn't seeing a difference, and also didn't feel it was exfoliating any better than my cloths I stopped using the Luna altogether. At this point I was set that I was going to return the thing. That lasted less than a week because toward the end of that time, I finally noticed something.
When I applied my face oil and started rubbing it into my skin, I could feel little bits of skin that didn't come off with the cloths. The more I rubbed, the more I could feel coming off...and I wold keep adding oil and keep rubbing until I couldn't feel the little bits any longer. You might think this is strange, but I didn't because this is something I've noticed the longer I use oils. I don't know this for a fact, but my theory is because the oils help loosen the skin that's ready to come off and when you keep rubbing...well it's like a little exfoliation session!
Soooo...the fact that I noticed this wasn't what was surprising, since I had experienced it before. What was surprising, and kind of an 'ah ha' when it finally dawned on me, was that I didn't remember experiencing this while I was using the Luna - even when I was using it intermittently. I've been back to using the Luna about a week now and no longer feel the little skin bits when I apply my face oil (sorry it sounds ew!). Point being, the Luna definitely exfoliates better than my cloths, even if it doesn't feel like it!
Total I've been using the Luna for about a month, which does take into account the week of non use (***Edit: Sorry!! Actually it's been about 3 weeks, taking into account the time of non-use. I know many of you won't think that's enough time, but since I did notice a difference from when I stopped...for me I feel like that was good enough***). Here I was all set to return this little gadget, but now I'm reconsidering and am probably going to just keep using it. 1 minute out of my life won't kill me, and I actually think how well it exfoliates is worth the time! Plus, since I was able to snag this on sale it wasn't too terrible price-wise.
Maybe someone else can chime in if they've experienced any anti-aging benefits??? Anyone else tried the Luna? Did you love it, hate it, ambivalent about it...??