FANCL Skincare Travel Set

I was shopping around for a smaller sized oil cleanser I could take with me on my home visit, and to my disappointment there wasn't anything at the local drugstore that was small enough or travel-friendly enough. 

The problem I found with most oil cleansers is that they are stored in pump bottles, which are not travel-friendly at all. Even if you put a pump stopper on, they would still leak from the air pressure on the plane. I tried wrapping them in saran wrap to keeping the stuff from spilling everywhere, however that results in an inconvenient mess when I go to wash my face at the airport. The twist caps were similarly troublesome. Another big problem is that, well, thanks you-know-who we are now allowed only 3 fl. oz. (~100mL) of each liquid/gel/cream toiletry in our carry-ons, and they all have to fit into one ziplock bag per person. So even the half size oil cleansers I found at the drugstore were either over 100mL or the packaging was too big. 

Thank goodness for conbinis, where you can find many conveniently packaged toiletries meant for use during travel! That was where I found this nifty little FANCL Skincase Travel Set!

There are different skincare sets such as one for normal skin, one for anti-aging, etc., and I picked one for normal skin. 

This FANCL Skincare Travel Set cost me about 1,000yen (~$13) and came with a plastic hard case, 40mL each of the Lotion and Milky Lotion, 10 packets each of Mild Cleansing Oil and Washing Powder, and a foaming ball. 

Sure it was a bit pricey, but damn it was so convenient I was happy to pay the price! In fact, I like this travel set so much I might go out and buy another one just for the hell of it, may be I'll try a different skincare set or something!

I have already reviewed the FANCL Mild Cleansing Oil, so I'll skip straight to the other goodies.

Washing Powder: This is my second time using a powder foaming cleanser, with the first being DHC Washing Powder, which I didn't quite like. I was afraid this FANCL one might be too harsh also, but it turned out to be a mild foaming powder that left my skin feeling clean and soft afterwards. It is scented, which is surprising since FANCL targets people with sensitive skin. That said, the fragrance is very light and at least I found it pleasant. The foaming ball that comes with this travel set is awesome, by the way! You just wet it, squeeze out all the water, pour some powder onto your palm, use the dampened ball to mop up the powder and squeeze to work into a lather, then wash your face with the foam (not with the ball itself - it's not meant to be a facial scrub and is rather rough). I only used half a packet at a time because the ball really helped making the lather thick and creamy. The big bummer is that I left my foaming ball out to dry and ended up forgetting it at the hotel when hubby and I checked out. So that's another reason why I'm itching to get another one of these travel sets - yes, I want another foaming ball!! ^.^

Lotion: Ok, I think the one mistake I keep making over and over again is to use Japanese/Korean made toners the same way I use the ones at home, that is, to soak a cotton ball and wipe my face with it. Bad, very bad idea. Every time I did this, my face became a sticky icky mess, so yucky I had to go rinse off with water and start all over again. May be I ought to, ahem, read the instructions again, but I've been pouring a few drops into my palm and pat them onto my bare face instead, prior to applying moisturizers. I tried this method for the very first time with The Body Shop Vitamin E Hydrating Toner and found it work rather well, especially in the morning, and especially in the hot and humid Japanese summer. 

So I started doing this with the toners I couldn't soak a cotton pad and wipe my face with, which is pretty much all the Japanese toners I've tried so far, including this FANCL Lotion. If anything, in the summer I skip moisturizer altogether as I found wearing the toner alone underneath sunscreen is quite enough. Many of them contain some sort of moisturizing/hydrating agent anyway, which sort of explains why my skin feels so disgusting when I over-apply with a cotton ball. I believe these are *not* meant to replace moisturizers/hydrators, but it's also your skin so it's completely up to you when to stop piling stuff on. This FANCL Lotion feels nice when patted on and absorbs completely, unlike when I was trying to wipe my face with it using a cotton ball - urgh, yuck! Like many other Japanese toners, it is a tad viscous and not watery runny like the toners at home, though it's not as thick as some others here. It is unscented.  

Milky Lotion: this is a translucent milky emulsion that's a nice moisturizer on face as well as on the neck. I almost used up my 40mL travel bottle of this Milky Lotion on this trip, versus only about a 1/3 of the 40mL Lotion bottle. It feels light on the skin, and it absorbs quickly, even on top of the Lotion. It is also unscented, which makes it even stranger that the Washing Powder is scented!

***Pictures from FANCL North America.

The 40mL bottles of Lotion and Milky Lotion.