Baylis & Harding: body scrub and wash

The simplest of products can be made to be a little more glamorous just by adding a nice pack and a sweet scent. Shower gel, bubble bath and body scrub can command a ridiculous price point if they give the illusion that they're a bit more special than your average bottle of Radox. Baylis & Harding make a bit of a mint by pretending to be posher than they are, (Molton Brown rip off much?) but not leaving you sobbing as you hand over a £20 note for some hand wash. They do great gift sets and look pretty, but up until this point I hadn't really used their products myself... So step up Cleansing Honey Body Wash and Invigorating Walnut Body Scrub! I love the look of these tubes and the fact that they channel burnt caramel, plus the fact that they contain Fairtrade ingredients (I can only assume this is the honey and walnut) is always a winner. The body wash has a nice thick consistency that lathers well to leave a soft and fluffy foam on the skin, but the downside is that is has no fragrance whatsoever. I was channeling my inner scent expert trying to identify the top notes of honey, but I was left with absolutely nothing - no sweet buzzy scent, no refreshing and comforting lavender, just a scentless clear gel. The body scrub wasn't much better either, having a very (very) subtle fragrance that didn't stick around for longer than about three seconds. Even worse was that the body scrub contained practically no 'scrub' - you can see from the picture how small and sparse the kernels are, providing no exfoliating quality whatsoever. The creamy texture was pleasant to use though and didn't leave skin with any residue, but I felt a bit let down by something that seemed quite appealing at the outset. Considering these are only £3.00 each you were never going to get an awful lot for your buck, but I'd expect a scent in my scented body wash and some scrub in my exfoliator. I guess the moral of the story here is that you can't judge a book by its cover, and you certainly get what you pay for. Have you ever tried Baylis & Harding? 






The body range is available online here.