You’ve seen the ads, you’ve seen the testimonies, and now you want the beautiful sun-kissed glow for yourself. You purchase a bottle of self-tanner, use it right away, and you actually love it – until you notice splotches and streaks on your hands and feet. Nothing says self-tanning rookie more than those telling signs.
Don’t fret – rookie streaks are totally reversible. Here are our hacks for turning a bad self-tanning day into a good one.
Exfoliate the right way.
If you’ve followed the prep foundations for self-tanning, we assume that you are a pro at exfoliating by now. Our first tip for evening out splotches on hands and feet should be a piece of cake for you. Grab your favorite exfoliating mitt (try not to pick out the more rigid ones) and gently use circular motions to lightly rub and fade the tan. Important note: do not scrub too hard. Your skin might turn red and you won’t be able to accurately see if your tan is even. Also, you don’t want to exfoliate your tan away.
If your self-tanner is giving you a hard time, use a small amount of oil or body polish to help break down the tanning product. This will help you smoothen and even out your tan.
Grab your moisturiser.
One way to prolong your tan is to keep it moisturised. If you still have splotches that just won’t budge, you can work your moisturiser on the surrounding areas while avoiding the splotches. This will help protect the rest of your tan while giving you a more exposed surface to slough off unwanted spots.
Overdid the exfoliating? You can use a gradual tanner like Skinsation to help even out your tan. This works great because it has smaller room for error while you are trying to even out your colour.
Prepare to shower and soak.
If the tan just isn’t coming off and you want a do over, don’t fret: you can opt for a tan eraser that uses high quality ingredients. Just make sure to give that bottle label a good read and to do your research well. The last thing you want is to look like a chemical lab accident because the product caused an unwanted reaction to your tan.
If you don’t have access to a tan eraser and you need to remove it fast, whip out your favourite body scrub and mix it into your body or bath oil. Apply it to your skin and gently rub. Make sure to take your time so that the tan comes out evenly. Repeat as needed until you get the amount of the fade. This combination works great because oil breaks down the tanning product while the scrub gets rid of colour and dead skin.
Another method is to soak first before exfoliating. Fill up a bowl with warm water, add your bath or body oil, and soak your hands or feet for a couple of minutes. Then gently scrub the tan off using an exfoliator.
Look up tanning hacks.
To ensure you won’t make the same tanning mistakes, check out the rest of our blog posts for tons of useful tanning hacks to get that perfect even glow from your head to your toes.