Last week after the gym, I was saying that regular gym going and then having to put make up on myself while I was hot and a bit sweaty was at least making sure that I washed my make up brushes regularly. And so discovered that some people never wash their make up brushes at all.
This lead to a discussion of why (like cutting your hair every six weeks and taking your make up off your face before you go to bed) washing your make up brushes is an important and sensible thing to do. The argument goes like this:
1) You are putting those things on your face, they accumulate make up, dirt, bits of skin, germs, sweat and are a breeding ground for dirt and then you rub them on your face. It’s like rubbing dirt onto your clean face. Why would you do that? All that money you spend on fancy make up and face cream, wasted because you’re brushing dirt onto your face.
2) Dirty brushes don’t work as well as clean brushes and you’re not getting the best out of your make up if you’re applying it with something that’s all clogged up.
3) You’re rubbing dirt and germs into your face. Got spots? Now you know why.
4) It lengthens the life of the brushes, I’ve had most of mine for nearly five years, you should look after your stuff!
As you can probably tell, this went on for a while, punctuated by me, shuddering when I thought about it and muttering about dirt and disgusting yucky things. This is quite funny because I am as a general rule, not overly concerned about germs. I like things to be tidy and I like things to be clean but I’m not a person to over use anti germ sprays etc. I think that healthy immune systems need germs to function and I can’t be doing with people who anti-septic everything in sight.
However, I wear make up every day and so I wipe down my make up brushes every day (baby wipes are fabulous things) and I wash my make up brushes at least every other week. If you don’t and you think I’m mad, take a look at the picture below, this is the colour of the water after I’ve washed my brushes.
You can buy fancy make up brush wash but I use baby shampoo. I wash them all once and then do it again and rinse them under running water. It takes about ten minutes.
Before anyone asks, I wash my hairbrushes once a month too!
Nic Dempsey 
100% agree Nic,
WASH YOUR BRUSHES people!
I use a MAC make-up brush cleaner for the very reason your sink picture demonstrated so graphically!
Just the thought of putting a dirty, germ infested brush on my face gives me the jitters, yuck..
I’ve just started washing my makeup brushes and I was horrified at the colour of the water! I love the baby wipe trick I’m going to have to use that!
Yay one more person doing the right thing!! Baby wipes are useful for pretty much everythin, they are great for dusting, wiping down stainless steel, cleaning make up brushes, emergency face cleaning when I’m home late (and a bit merry), I used them to get ketchup off a friend’s wedding dress and sometimes I even use them on babies!
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