Bronze me up Hawko! A JBronze self tanner review

Something new and interesting today – and totally different – dear readers! A product review! None of that travel nonsense and Christmas hoo ha I normally write about. Nope, today I’m going to be extra white girl trashtastic and blog about fake tan.

So I haven’t used fake tan many times in my life. Maybe…five times. At the most. This was all mostly when I was at university and you know, concentrating on anything apart from my studies. Despite this relative inexperience I have miraculously never come away with fake tan hands (it just makes sense to scrub the shit out of your hands after applying fake tan doesn’t it?) or dreadful fake tan marks around my ankles or elbows.

Anyway, as is like, a must, for women’s magazines at this time of year, I recently came across an article titled ‘A beginner girl’s guide to becoming a bronzed goddess’. It detailed every, well, detail, about the art of fake tanning, from exfoliating to tanning gloves to the vast array of products on the market.

One of the products featured was this great stuff the magazine recommended by Le Tan that saw your bronze-ness develop in just 30 minutes. I snapped a pic of it on my iphone, intrigued, and kept it there for about two weeks to remind myself next time I was at the shops to perhaps pick up a bottle and that this was the bottle to try.

So Sunday morning I’m at Claremont Quarter amongst the wealthy Perth set who must cry over the fact that they can’t do their food shopping at QC’s David Jones because the store doesn’t have a foodhall, when I popped into a chemist to peruse the perfume to see how many I couldn’t afford (spoiler alert: all of them). Determined to spend my hard earned flight attendant dollars on something – anything - I went into the fake tan aisle and had a squiz.

The Le Tan I’d had my heart set on was not there, and when I later saw it in Coles it said it was of the wash off variety, which I didn’t want (no one day wonder tanners ploise!), so I went back to the chemist and because it was 25% off I decided to give JBronze, by Jennifer Hawkins a go. And since it was right next to it, I also picked up a Bondi Sands tanning glove.

Now I’ll be the first to admit I can be terrible sometimes and buy beauty products and then take forever to get around to using them. So when Sunday night passed and I got out of the shower and couldn’t be bothered doing a whole fake tanning routine I thought ‘right, Monday night I am definitely doing this. I paid $26 for this bottle and $10 for this glove and dammit I am going to use them!’

So tonight I got down to business. At the forefront of my mind was an episode from the most recent series of Australia’s Next Top Model when the girls got given a truckload of JBronze out of the kindness of Hawko’s heart and had to lather themselves from top to toe and do a photo shoot on the beach. Of course they looked like bronzed goddesses and applied it expertly and I was like, super jealous of their skill. With this thought in mind, I slipped that glove on and got to work. Since I had bypassed buying the fake tan applicator for your back when I was at the chemist, I decided, so as to not make a mess of an already precarious job, to just tan my legs and see how I went.

So anyway before I go on we should all talk about how you should never buy another tanning glove again – just buy the Bondi Sands one. It is top notch. Considering the only other tanning gloves I’ve had in my life have been ones I’ve gotten for free with magazine subscriptions or as part of a Royal Show showbag, I was quite pleased that when I actually paid physical money for this one it turned out to be worth shelling out for (as opposed to there being a very good reason all those other ones I’d had were free).

So, the facts. I used JBronze by Jennifer Hawkins Tanning Mousse in Medium. I decided to start small and go with the medium rather than the dark. I wanted bronzed goddess, not chocolate Easter egg. I feel this was a smart decision. The bottle is only 150ml, which seems like a lot, but because it’s liquid and comes out as a mousse, I feel like I used a lot, and upon closer inspection of the bottle realised I’ve already used a quarter of the stuff and I only used it on my legs and a little of my mid section. So, since some girls apply their fake tan every few days, or perhaps once a week, this already pricier than all the others fake tan just got pricierer.

Still, on with the show. I know I don’t have a lot of experience at fake tanning, as stated already, but I can easily say I was happy with this one. I chose mousse over spray too, as I can only imagine my Mum’s face if I got some spray tan on the bathroom tiles or her towels. Plus a mousse seemed less scary for the amateur that I am.

It was quite easy to apply, and I felt like I was doing an all right job thanks to that awesome glove I also bought, and this stuff even smelt all right too. Not your typical fake tan smell, just a slight coconutty tropical scent. The bottle states the tan includes green tea, aloe vera and walnut extracts, so perhaps that was why I was floating off to Hawaii a little as I applied/daydreamed.

Since the bottle said to wait at least four hours before showering, I assumed that was how long it took to properly develop. I am now on hour three as I write this and I’m pretty happy so far. No streaks, and no obviously fake look to my legs. The colour is subtle – like just enough for someone to notice and say ‘you look like you’ve caught some sun lately’ in a slightly envious way. It’s not so bronzed that it’s blatantly obvious you have got your brown out of a bottle. I am very interested to see how my legs look when I wake up tomorrow. Hopefully even better! If not, I am considering doing a second application tomorrow night, just to see what affect it has (and because I wear black stockings to work and nobody will be able to see if I make a Hawaiian Tropic mess of it all).

And on that note, let me tell you, I will never be buying the face tanner. Fake tanning my face is just way too scary. One day I’d like to work up the courage and get a spray tan done by a professional, but until then I’ll happily stick my hand up and say Hawko’s was the best at home experience I've had, even now, when it’s not fully developed on my fat legs yet. I guess, at least in this instance, higher price = greater quality! I'll admit, when I first heard about this line of hers I was quite sceptical, thinking 'oh it's just another celebrity putting their name to something' and not really having any input or caring about the quality of the product. But I actually really don't think this is the case with JBronze. It seems like a legit tanning product of high quality. You can't help but feel the supermodel probably has much experience in this field given her 10+ years of modelling and probably wearing fake tan more days than she doesn't, and it shows in this product she has created. Give it shot bronzed wannabe babes!

Australia’s Next Top Model, here I come!

Your bronzed goddess,

Jorgs

For more info, and to see the full range, head to www.jbronze.com.au/products/medium-tanning-mousse

*This blog was not a paid endorsement