Beauty Review: L'Oreal Paris Rapid Reviver Conditioner*

My relationship with my hair is complicated.

For the last 12 years of my life, I’ve gone through a series of cut-into-pixie-and-grow-as-long-as-possible periods. I got my hair cut into a pixie just weeks before I had Forrest, then didn’t get a haircut for 3 years. (My hairdresser, as you can imagine, was as shocked as me. It really didn’t feel like 3 years, in my defense.)

In the last year and a half as well, I’ve developed an intensely dry scalp, that can be flaky, but mostly just deeply annoying. Sometimes, it’s tied to my cycle. Sometimes, it’s made worse or better by what I use in my hair. But the baseline for my scalp seems to be dry as hell, with a side of flakiness, and that’s just… my normal as an adult. It goes without saying: of all the terrible genetic traits to inherit, why this one (and my slow as heck metabolism)?

Whenever I look for products for my hair and scalp now, I have to be really clear about what I’m looking for: my hair itself isn’t necessarily dry, but my scalp is; my hair handles sulfate-free shampoos well, but not sulfate-free conditioners; harsh dandruff ingredients irritate my scalp worse; I need moisturizing, but not too much or it weighs down my hair… the list goes on.

When I received this conditioner for review, I was convinced I was going to hate it. The L’Oréal Paris Elvive Extraordinary Oil Rapid Reviver Deep Conditioner has the longest product name in the world (I struggled to shorten it for this blog post) and promises to “provide 2X more nourishment than any leading conditioner” and to be “lightweight, hydrating and moisturizing.” Two of those words mean the same thing, so… we’ll see.

Extraordinary Oil sounds way, way too heavy, doesn’t it? However, despite being called “Extraordinary Oil” and “a hair treatment” in various places both on the L’Oreal website and the tube, it also says it’s for daily use. Now, I subscribe to the idea that you don’t need to (and probably shouldn’t) wash your hair every single day. So using a heavy conditioner every day seems like a lot.

I use a lot of hair masks, so I was fully prepared for this conditioner to have the texture of a hair mask. However, it doesn’t. It’s a fairly standard conditioner when you get down to it; it doesn’t feel heavy and it gives your hair that slippy feeling when you apply it. I’ll admit to being fairly addicted to conditioner; I never don’t use it, because my hair can be unmanageable without it. I love the slippy, smooth feeling and even though I know that’s sulfates, and the internet tells me that sulfates are bad for my hair, I also don’t like not using it… because then my hair turns into a single tangle that I can’t get out! Give me sulfates in my conditioner or give me death!

Did I like this conditioner? Yes! I did. It was hydrating for my scalp and didn’t weigh down my hair as much as I thought it would. However, do I think it is anything special? Not necessarily. Despite all the fancy names, it doesn’t really promise to be anything besides a hydrating conditioner—which is what all conditioners do. Whenever I’m testing a hair product, I have to ask myself, over and over again, if I’m noticing a difference in my scalp (better or worse); preferably, it’s actually best that a product has no effect on my scalp. This product is one of those where it didn’t make my scalp better or worse, which is often a solid win for me.

Is this a particularly special conditioner? Not really. It didn’t necessarily wow me in terms of making my hair look any different from any other conditioner. It should be said, again: I don’t really have dry hair, just a dry scalp, and my hair isn’t damaged from heat treatment or hair dye. The bonus is this is only around $4-6 depending on which drug store you go to. (The downside is that L’Oreal Paris tests on animals.) If you’re looking for a good, affordable conditioner, and you struggle with hair that is dry or damaged, this is a great option.

Would I repurchase? It depends. I think if I started heat treating my hair more, I would probably look for something similar (but cruelty free) to use, as it is really hydrating. But this specific product? Probably not.

Disclaimer: As denoted by the asterisk (*) in the title of this blog post, I received this product in exchange for review. If you’d like to learn more about my disclosure policy, click here.

Beauty Review: Brite Briteplex Unicorn Masque

My hair, and scalp, has been one of my biggest struggles for the last year. I've always bounced back and forth between long hair and very short hair--but this is the longest I've had significantly longer hair. And my hair is actually the longest it has been since I was... 15 or 16, I think! 

A few months ago, I was in Ulta looking for some things to buy with a 20% off coupon and I found a bunch of hair masks from BRITE Organix. I had never heard of this brand before, but they are cruelty free and vegan, two things that are pretty important to me. I decided to go for it and try the Briteplex Unicorn Masque. Here's why: 

“You totally deserve a treat.

I’m your weekly or twice weekly repair treatment. If you want to I can even sleep over (yup you can use me as an overnight masque).

We all know things get pretty rough when you bleach and colour frequently.

Urgh even hot irons and blow outs take their toll, so we’ve created a professional hair treatment for you to use at home and added a bit of sparkle to make things super fun and sparkly while you repair your hair.

I’m packed full of bond building ingredients to repair your damaged hair, fight frizz and create healthy hair between chemical services (like bleaching and colouring).”

Those are some promises! As I've mentioned, I've struggled with dry, itchy scalp for almost a year now--probably because my hair is quite long, I wasn't using inappropriate shampoos and not conditioning my scalp, and the ends of my hair were damaged from not getting hair cuts (oops). Switching shampoos, using oil, and trimming my ends has helped my scalp problems... but the ends of my hair are still fried and I'm still putting off getting a hair cut. (I would have to stop working on one of my million projects to do it, wouldn't I? *insert panicked mom gif here*) 

This mask promises to heal hair damage, basically, and help bond hair. I use split end sealer and jojoba oil on my ends daily, and while it certainly helps, I knew I could be doing more. This mask seemed like the perfect option. 

I bought this mask for $12 at Ulta. That's quite expensive for a hair mask; however, I've used it probably 5 times already and have enough for another 1 or 2 uses. That's pretty good and evens out to a fair price. Brite is an Australian company, so their website is in AUD--however, all their products are available at Ulta, but they do also ship worldwide. 

My Experience

I used this mask after washing my hair with OGX Coconut Milk shampoo; I then put on the mask, pretty heavily, and tied my hair up in a bun. I let it sit for about 20-25 minutes while I read. It smells really good--a faintly sweet smell, not too medicinal and not too heavy. When I rinsed it, my hair instantly had that really soft feeling that often happens when I use conditioner. Once I let it dry, my hair looked a lot shinier and my ends didn't look quite as frazzled. 

You know what's odd? While reading the reviews and product description, it seems to suggest there is glitter in this mask. I didn't notice or see any glitter. Granted, I haven't used the entire package yet, but I'm squeezed up from the bottom and... no glitter or sparkle. Isn't that odd? Perhaps it's just the one I got, but that was something very strange I noticed while reading reviews. I'm kind of glad, as I'm not sure my scalp could tolerate glitter of any kind. 

Aside from that, I did really enjoy this mask. My hair felt quite soft for several days after using it. I try not to use it more than once a week, however, as it could easily weigh down finer hair. I'm quite happy with the results and will definitely be repurchasing!