Make Your Own Skincare: e-Learning Modular Course

Taking care of our skin each day is something that the majority of us strive to do and do well. With an abundance of products now on the market it can sometimes be hard to know what is truly good for your skin and which products represent good value for money.

Heading to your local Boots or Superdrug is something we usually don't think twice about when hoping to buy a new skincare product, but have you ever thought about making your own?

The question may sound daunting to some and familiar to others but regardless of your experience in making skincare, at Plush Folly we've made learning how to make a skincare range to rival the rest simple and fun.

Whether you want to set up a business or simply immerse yourself in a new hobby, our modular e-Learning Skincare Course allows you to pick and choose which topics you want to learn to ensure you learn exactly what you want.

June Intensive Cosmetic College - Day Five

The last day of our June Intensive Week and still plenty to cram in!

The morning started with a practical session and the students made beautiful lip glosses followed by a treatment balm. The lip glosses contained a selection of oils, butters and wax designed to nourish and soften the lips and each were laced with mica to give beautiful shades of gold to pink to a very glossy burgundy - beautiful!

Each student designed their own treatment salve and we had a range of hair wax, rash treatment, nail and cuticle balm, eczema treatment salve, cracked finger ointment and elbow grease!

From practical to theory and having remembered to give homework the night before, Sally went over labelling, weights and measures, allergens, specialist software and everything else that you need to consider when putting together and producing labels for your cosmetic products.

June Intensive Cosmetic College - Day Four

Day Four already! Where has the time gone? Today we had a day of soap - traditional bars of soap and liquid soap.

The initial fears of dealing with soidum hydroxide were soon dispelled although goggle and gloves were donned in order to provide protection against splashes. As the morning progressed, the benefits of the different oils and butters used in soap became apparent and the chosen oils were weighed into the saucepan to melt.

Although Sally forgot to give the blending homework the night before (tut tut!) we all managed to find the time to make delicous blends of essential oils to use in their soap. As discussed in the colour session on Tuesday, we used the Blue FCF colouring to turn our soap a wonderful shade of well - first it was blue, then we watched it turn grey, then a murky burgundy colour and finally amazing and glorious pink!

June Intensive Cosmetic College - Day Three

I can't believe we are half way through already!

The day started earlier than usual for Sally and Debbie, our student from Spain. When booking, Debbie asked if we could include making bath salts in the course curriculum and as it is wall-to-wall packed content already, the only way was to start 45 minutes early! Not for the faint-hearted but enthusiasm won the day and bath salts were taught.

We always stress that there are no mistakes - simply learning experiences - which was lucky as it was assumed that the bottle of liquid colour had a dripper insert in the neck of the bottle. Oh how wrong we were and CI17200 pink went gushing into the mixture...luckily, the right side of a black coffee or two, Sally grabbed the jug and quickly spooned out the excess colour before it had a chance to be absorbed. And the best products can often come from mistakes - the final heather sprinkled bath salts were magnificent!

June Intensive Cosmetic College - Day Two

What a busy day for the students! We started the day with a session on colours and had fun striping our arms with various shades of micas, oxides, ultramarines and lakes. The colours and skin feel were compared and Nickie did a great job of testing whether the colours were water or oil soluble.

All went well until Sally pulled a horrible trick of mixing blue ultramarine with water and citric acid...poooooooey!

OK, so now everyone understood the suitability of the colours in different cosmetic products, we set about using some of those colours and mixing up a variety of bath fizz.

From fizz to scrubs and the students made a stunning selection of salts and

sugar scrubs adorned with seeds, seaweed and other exfoliating ingredients.

June Intensive Cosmetic College

After a miserable weekend of rain, rain and more rain, a watery sun and Monday morning arrived along with students from Norway, Spain, Scotland, Wales and various parts of England.

After introductions and settling in, the course dived straight into studying the characteristic of a wide range of carrier oils. Plunging the students into the depths of oleic, myristic and other fatty acids, the properties, benefits and behaviour on the oils on skin was explored and the students created their own range of skin, hair or body oils. Argan oil received a lot of attention although the jojoba oil bottles seemed to be emptiest at the end of the exercise!

Students' Success! NV Launch their Beautiful Candles

NV CANDLES

In November 2010 sisters Vicky and Nickie attended a Candle Workshop here at Plush Folly. In just six months, they've managed to build their own business from what started as a quest to find the perfect candle to suit their personal taste.

They're currently to be found at Pulse Exhibition at Earls Court launching their range of candles - what an exciting start to their business!

http://www.pulse-london.com

http://www.nvcandles.co.uk

Cosmetics College - even more beautiful than usual

This week we have had a Cosmetics College student visiting us from Antigua. Not only was it her first trip to England, but it was the first time she'd seen snow! And what a performance the weather put on for her.

Deep, crisp and even.....beautiful twinkling mica-like snow covering everything it could touch. This was no dusting of talc, this was a heavy dollop of ice-cold pleasure! OK, so she missed the first day of college due to the plane being delayed, but luckily with other students finding they couldn't make the journey, we could dedicate our time during the second and subsequent days and cover everything she needed.

It's quite incredible to think that her family were basking in 80 degrees and relaxing on the beach drinking coconut rum while she was enchanted by mineral makeup, coconut soap and snowballs!