covet this: molton brown’s body therapies collection
I met my beloved when I was thirteen. By all appearances, I was still a child, who was fumbling my way into the horror that was adolescence (and failing miserably at it), when I encountered a man, but really a boy posturing as a learned adult, in the stacks of a musty library. He was a misanthrope with a fragile heart, and a mind that seemed to understand the complexities of the world in which he inhabited so completely but at the same time be wholly ignorant of its rules of engagement. He smoked, played records, gave his roommate “the business,” and tearfully watched his beautiful, innocent sister, Phoebe, his catcher, riding in a gilded, magical carousel. The boy was Holden Caulfield. The book was The Catcher in the Rye, and I will always be indebted to Salinger for creating a character who was just as lonely as I was.
For the next year, I tore through the whole of his work, and whether it be the eccentric goings-on of the Glass family, desperate for spiritual purification, in Franny and Zooey, or the disquieting, yet extraordinary Nine Stories, where we encounter a refined gentry that is seemingly serene on the surface yet their masks threaten to crack - many of Salinger’s characters have a keen, almost evangelical affection for the bathroom and its purported healing and meditative properties. The smallest room in one’s home, two walls, a window, and a door, but the calm it creates is on the level of zen. Salinger speaks of the austerity of the white walls and it put me to thinking that there is something mystical about bathing rooms - the idea that you’re sousing off the day’s dirt, excesses, and ills, and you leave clean, almost virginal and reborn. There is something soothing about cool tile floors, a running bath, and a window crept open. A door locked.
So for years, the notion of bathrooms as refuge settled with me, and it is the one room where I can come undone. And since I don’t see much luxury these days, and there are a great deal of things going on in my personal life - all of which aren’t worthy of celebration - I’m taking comfort in the small pleasures: sneaking in my bathroom, closing the door, turning the spigots to hot and simply falling to quiet. And having a delicious selection of bath gels and gentle exfoliants sure doesn’t hurt, and is decidedly cheaper than jetting off to Fiji in search of iridescent algae. But I’m digressing.
Yesterday, I had the opportunity to visit Molton Brown, a luxurious emporium of bath crystals, tonics, lotions, and body balms - all at varying price points, all meant to relieve you of your daily stresses. For over two decades, Molton Brown evolved in the UK as a natural salon to a full-scale emporium where plant-based make-up, hair, body, skin and grooming products were sold to those in the know. And soon the world’s chic hotels and airlines were phoning, and now you can locate their products in 70 countries as well as online.
Most recently, the company launched their body therapies line - the ultimate range of 14 unwinding and uplifting remedies to treat the entire body for whether you’re unwinding at home or traveling across the continents. The concept of the four collections was to present bath and body products for use at varying points in the day (purify, unwind, nurture, sleep) - from the morning purifying rituals to give skin a boost to the Bulgarian lavender infused and citrus oils that are certain to ease you blissfully to slumber. The packaging is completely eco-friendly (although I did inquire about the possibility of “refill stages” to reduce the amount of bottles consumed, and there are no plans to launch that phase of recycled packaging), and is unisexual. Priced from $34-$52, the therapies collection is a fine midpoint between their lower and high-end lines, although their reps stressed that the line is more about added-value and the efficaciousness of the products as opposed to considering price sensitivity. Tonight, I indulged in two products from the line: The Desert Bloom Shower Cream (nurture line) and The Ambrusca Body Wash & Polish (purify line), and I left the shower softened, relaxed, and moisturized.
The Desert Bloom Shower Cream ($32 for 6.8oz): A unique richly foaming shower gel formula which gently cleanses and moisturizes dry, sensitive skin with desert plant and tree oils. The gel is perfect for dry, sensitive, and overexposed skin, and with a trio of tree extracts, olive and raspberry oils, and the infusion of African desert plans, not only did I leave the shower with smooth, supple skin, I smelled and felt blissed out. What I like about these products is that you smell clean rather than enduring a heady, fragrant scent that inevitably clings to your clothes.
The Ambrusca Body Wash & Polish ($32 for 6.8oz): This bodywash & polish exfoliates old skin cells, deep cleanses, stimulates and boosts circulation. What I loved about this were the tiny, delicate microbeads that gently exfoliated the skin without being too abrasive. And since I sometimes get lax about post-shower moisturizing, I felt this gave me the extra hydrating boost I so desperately craved.
Verdict: Loves it! Delicious! Will never leave tub even if I develop raisin skin.
