I've been searching for the ultimate brush soap for quite some time and thought I had found it in Becca's Professional Brush Soap. I was giddy that it cleaned so quickly with little foaming. That absence of foam made it easy to rinse. The brushes also seemed to dry much quicker, too.
However....... Becca did themselves no favors by being out of stock for four months. You cannot find the product anywhere. They recently informed me that it won't be back in stock until May. As they kept extending out the date, I have lost interest.
I have a love-hate relationship with Becca. Their products are very luxe and with that comes a hefty price. Initially, I bought the Skin Perfector in Pearl which is amazing. I have their cheek tints which are quite lovely , but are kind of a pain to use since they separate in the tube. I don't find I reach for them very often because they are more time-consuming. Then, there is the case for their brushes. I have personally made the decision to only purchase synthetic hair brushes. When I saw that they use raccoon in one of their brushes, I was appalled, and wrote to the company. I was referred to their CEO, who did respond promptly to my inquiries. We exchanged several emails, and, although I was impressed that he took the time to correspond with me, his assurances that no animals were harmed fell flat. So, I decided that without PETA's cruelty-free endorsement, I had to put this company on my DO NOT BUY list. That included the elusive soap, too. Bummer.
Enter ShiKai to save the day! As my only Becca brush soap container was winding down and I could hear the clock ticking to the Jeopardy theme song, I decided to grab my ShiKai pump hand soap last night to clean a few brushes. ShiKai is a wonderful company that participates not only with PETA to obtain cruelty-free status, but also with the high standards of LeapingBunny . You don't get much better than that.
I love their shower gels. And, on a whim, I picked up their Very Clean Hand Soaps during my last order from an online seller. I was amazed how well they worked and how nice they felt on the skin. Last night, while quickly trying to clean my brushes, I decided not to use my Becca soap and grabbed my hand soap instead. WHAT? It was amazing! I found myself grabbing every dirty brush, even if it had one particle of powder on it, to test out the ShiKai hand soap. Fast, easy and no mess. Then, the ultimate test.... my Sigmax synthetic brushes which are incredibly dense and require several cleanings, even with the Becca soap. Literally, one minute. Not only did it clean all the makeup out of the brush COMPLETELY, but it rinsed in the same amount of time as the Becca. All in one cleaning attempt. I was stunned. Euphoria...my search was over....
I am thrilled to say the least. If you abhor washing your brushes, especially your dense synthetic ones, you will be amazed at how well the Shikai soaps work. I also found they dried in the same amount of time as using the Becca, too. Another advantage to the ShiKai is that I don't have to fight that annoying Becca tin that sometimes is a pain to open. My tin is already starting to rust, too, which was disappointing. And, when you use the soap, the bottom of the tin gets gooey and yucky. ShiKai is a simple solution for hands and brushes with a no-mess pump. My life needs to be that simple.
You can get ShiKai hand soap directly from Very Clean Liquid Hand Soap. You may be able to find it at a retailer near you. Search the Store Locator link to find a store near you. I also highly recommend the shower gels.
