The minimalist beauty brand is a Sephora exclusive (and currently at Kohl’s). Its founder Katherine Power has created a curated 5-minute makeup routine with the belief that clean beauty should look as natural as possible. The brand has 9 products including the essentials and a brush (but is best known for the Minimalist Perfecting Complexion Stick and the Flush Balm Cheek Color). All formulas are clean, non-toxic, and vegan and the entire line is EU and Clean at Sephora compliant with a full list of ingredients on the website. They are also Leaping Bunny certified and try to eliminate as much virgin plastic as possible.
The brand has earned a cult following thanks to its minimalist aesthetic and approach to yummy formulas packed with nourishing vegan ingredients but I’m not a fan of their slick greenwashing claims. For starters, the lack of third-party verification makes me doubt their “clean” claims a bit. It’s hard to take a beauty brand’s word when they use terms like “free of synthetic fragrances, fillers and parabens” when there are no third-party companies doing the independent testing for them.
Plus, a few of the formulas contain some questionable ingredients. The Complexion Stick uses acrylates copolymer that is made by treating phenol with ethylene oxide. This chemical releases benzene which is a known human carcinogen through dermal, inhalation and skin contact exposure. It’s also found in the Brow 1980 Volumizing Pomade and the Clean Lash Lengthening Mascara along with Pentaerythrityl Tetra-di-butyl Hydroxyhydrocinnamate which is a suspected neurotoxicant that can cause dermatitis. It’s also in the Great Skin Instant Glow Serum. Merit Beauty Review
Leave a Reply