I consider myself to be someone who has a fairly good skin care routine. I cleanse, tone and moisturise on a daily basis, and then hope to a higher power, that maybe my skin will look flawless. I am also an avid user of face masks and I have been on the hunt for over a year to find the perfect one for my skin, and when I saw that this face mask was the 2016 ‘Pure Beauty Awards’ Gold Winner, well I had to try it out.

The mask itself is claimed to detoxify any oils and impurities in the skin as it is an exfoliating mud mask. It contains natural charcoal, a compound know to specifically draw out impurities and absorb oils, as well as containing crush walnut shell to exfoliate the skin to leave it feeling smooth and renewed. The mask also list black lava as a key ingredient which is a harvested salt that contains activated charcoal. (Psst… vegans, you can use this one).

This particular mask must be used on recently cleansed skin, so it is ideal to apply it directly after showering or during bathing, in fact it is recommended to apply it during a bath so when rinsed off all the mud minerals can disperse over the entire skin to nourish it. I personally applied it directly after showering.

I found this mask to work wonders. It is not hard to understand why it won an award. My skin not only looks soft, but it feels softer than it has ever been. My pores around my nose and on my upper cheeks, just under the eye contour, look visibly reduced. The severity of blackheads on and around my nose have been visibly reduced and my skin feels lighter.

When I normally apply other masks, I will suffer severe redness that can last up to about half an hour before diminishing, but not with this mask. There was redness, but it was minimal and it was around the edges of my face, which is not where normal redness occurs for me. I normally have fairly pink cheeks, and this mask seemed to dull that colour, which was an added bonus that I was not expecting.

There is only one concern I have with this mask, and that is the size of the exfoliating beads. As these “beads” are actually crushed walnut shells, they are quite large which can lead to micro-tears in pores, but this is only a minor concern as there is no way to determine, in a normal everyday circumstance, that this is occurring.

Would I use this again?: Yes, I would 100% use this mask again because my skin looks and feels amazing.

What would I rate this out of 5?: 4.5/5 for the fact of the size of the exfoliating beads and the residual blackheads.

Would I recommend it?: I would 100% recommend this for people with normal or oily skin. If you have dry or sensitive skin I would not recommend that you use this product as it may damage you skin, cause irritation or if you have flaky skin, light bleeding from the exfoliating beads.

Purchase here: Boohoo (online), Big W (instore), Priceline (instore)