How To Clean Reusable Makeup Remover Pads

Like many people at the moment, I am always looking for more sustainable solutions. Every bit someone pretty into makeup and skincare, I get through a fair amount of cotton pads each day, so it fabricated sense for me to seek an alternative.

Posts about reusable cotton pads were doing the rounds on social media, so I decided to give them a get. While some people on Twitter and Instagram were buying packs of reusable cotton fiber pads for only a few pounds, I really wanted this to exist a long lasting solution, and so chose something a little pricier so I could get better quality cotton wool.

However, while the concept is a great idea, ultimately, reusable cotton pads just haven't worked for me.

Using the Reusable Cotton Pads

The pads I chose were from Maca Valley, and described as Reusable Makeup Remover Pads, which also came with a Muslin Textile. The set comprises of sixteen organic cotton and bamboo pads and one muslin fabric. The pads are double sided, with i side being a cotton wool cloth and the other side muslin.

Each pad is larger than your typical cotton wool pad, meaning that one of these reusable pads is about the equivalent of three disposable cotton fiber pads. When it comes to getting your makeup off, these pads do a pretty good job.

The only thing to be careful with is pouring on the makeup remover liquid, as the pads aren't the almost absorptive, so annihilation y'all pour on it has a trend of rolling off if you don't permit information technology settle for a few seconds. Other than that, using the cotton wool pads and muslin material is easy. Unfortunately, the cleaning process is a lot more than hard, and is the reason why I would not recommend these reusable cotton wool pads.

Washing the Reusable Cotton Pads

The washing instructions for these cotton fiber pads say to identify the pads in the mesh pocketbook and wash at xxx-forty degrees Celsius. I had washed the start couple of cotton pads past hand in the sink right later on using them, but they were never 100 per centum clean, so I decided to wash all of the pads as described in the instructions.

However, after one round in the washing machine, none of the pads were make clean. After a second become through the machine, I nonetheless wasn't satisfied with the results. Some looked clean at first glance, but upon closer inspection were more grey than white, and conspicuously weren't fully clean.

Couldn't become them make clean

Others were most equally dirty as when they went in the wash – particularly those which had lipstick or eyeliner on them. While I can sympathise that some makeup may be more likely to cause staining, these pads were advertised as makeup remover pads, and so I would have expected them to be able to cope with makeup!

Every bit the washing machine had not sufficiently cleaned them, I took to soaking the pads in the sink. I manus done each of the pads with baby shampoo to try to shift some of the makeup, but this didn't exercise a great deal. As a final endeavor, I boiled the pads in a pan of water, and so that they would at least be more sterile.

As you lot can see, the amount of product that remains on the pads makes them pretty unusable. While a lot of the makeup has gone, the pads remain fairly grey and mucky looking, and some marks won't shift at all.

Reusable Cotton fiber Pads Before Washing

Reusable Cotton Pads Subsequently Washing

Drying the Reusable Cotton Pads

The next outcome came from drying the pads. At that place are no instructions regarding how these pads should be dried on the packaging or online. I guessed that tumble drying would not work, then I only popped one pad in the dryer to exam it. As I had anticipated, the Muslin side of the pad shrunk, making the cotton fiber pad curl at the edges. It certainly didn't become unusable, but it wouldn't prevarication flat and you lot lost a fair amount of the Muslin size.

I so left the residual of the pads to air dry, but after a day, they were just equally damp equally when I kickoff put them out. Going abroad for the weekend, I left the pads out to dry out around the house, but three days on, they were still a little damp. I popped the heating on for an 60 minutes or so to go them back to being usable. Nevertheless, after 4 days lying effectually drying, some pads had collected a bit of dust, and so were again unclean! How annoying!

Not easy to use

All in all, the cleaning and drying procedure was such a hassle, and I feel similar I've wasted water and energy in the number of times I had to unsuccessfully launder them and have the heating on in June – neither of which actually make these "reusable pads" environmentally friendly.

I'm sure these pads are good enough for some people, but I wanted an easy solution, and not to have to spend hours scrubbing these wipes. I'll be putting these pads to some other utilize – probably re-purposed as a house cleaning cloth, but they simply aren't clean enough to apply on my confront again!

I'thou still on the spotter for an eco-friendly makeup removing cloth at present, and so if you have any recommendations, delight drop me a comment below!

2020 UPDATE: I now use a makeup remover cloth I bought in B&Thousand for £1.99 that effectively removes my makeup and the material does not stain after washing, even for mascara and lipstick. I would 100% recommend using a makeup remover cloth rather than these pads – information technology doesn't have to exist expensive.

How-do-you-do! I'yard Ellen, a Devon-based beauty and lifestly blogger who is perhaps a petty too obsessed with makeup and skincare (seriously, I own over 100 lipsticks…). 💄