Drunk Elephant The Littles Review

My skin went completely whacko when I was pregnant. At first I thought my skin was invincible no matter what I did to it, because for the first month I knew I was pregnant it was beautiful. But then, all the sudden, I started getting crazy cystic acne on my chin. I've been known to get the occasional cyst during my period, but this was different. It was a new bump every couple days, and they would each last a couple weeks at a time. Eventually when I got to the third trimester they stopped showing up as frequently, and eventually shifted down to small bumps or blackheads.

In the aftermath, I was left with a lot of redness on my chin and a couple darker spots. And, because I was trying to figure out what was causing my skin to freak out I had dropped most of my skincare products, so my skin was also really dull and lifeless. And while I'd like to blame the pregnancy for large pores, that is something I've always dealt with. My skin naturally is oily in my t-zone and regular on my cheeks.

(Also, instead of "cheeks" I just typed "chins." Oh dear. I hope I just have the one.)

Enter: Drunk Elephant The Littles

Since my skin was so bad, I decided to try the Drunk Elephant The Littles set as a kind of reset for my skin. I'd heard about Drunk Elephant for years and always wanted to try it because I'd heard about good results and that it's a natural skincare line. But since everything is so expensive I never actually bought anything. Enter The Littles. It's a set of eight of their more popular items that are designed to be a full skincare routine. There are two serums for day, two serums for night, a facewash, a sunscreen, a face lotion, and an eye cream.

What the products are like

The two serums at a time thing sounded a little crazy to me (I usually use one at night and none in the morning) but I actually really liked the way it felt - so luxurious! And I really love the concept, because there is a moisturizing serum that you use after the harsher one for both morning and evening, so you are never overloading your skin. I definitely got much brighter and glowy skin from the serums!

I liked the sunscreen, but as an added step I'm not really into it (I usually use a lotion that has sunscreen in it) and wasn't wowed by the eye cream. Weirdly, I loved the facewash. It's this cool, gel texture that you don't need to add water to at first. It's kind of like using an oil cleanser, where it is amazing at removing all traces of makeup (including my waterproof mascara!) and then you add water and it lathers up like a regular facewash.

How long it lasts

At $90 for the kit (I got mine for 20% off during the last Sephora sale) I was really hoping these would last me a while. I started to hit bottom on products at the 4 week mark - that's when the lotion, eye cream, and sunscreen ran out. The facewash made it to week 5, and all of the serums are still going strong now at week 7! Which makes me wonder if I should have been using more product this whole time?? But really, I was figuring I'd get two weeks max out of everything so I'm pretty happy that this little set lasted me so long.

(Sidebar: while taking this photo, I somehow managed to  knock the picture down and break the frame. In case you're wondering, the weak part of a cheap picture frame is the outer frame itself, because little chunks of it broke off behind the little brads on the back that turn to hold the back in place. Which is so not how I would have thought a picture frame would break.)

The Results

I'm always a sceptic of people toting amazing results from skincare. My skin looked great after a month of using Drunk Elephant, but not like anyone else would notice but me! I definitely saw brighter skin and smaller pores, and more importantly, I didn't have a single breakout when using the line - even when I missed a couple nights of washing my face! That's really unusual for me, usually even a little slacking on my skincare routine shows right away.

Would I buy the full-size Drunk Elephant products?

When I shared that I was using these on Instagram stories, I initially said I was thinking I'd just rebuy the set once I ran out of everything, because, let's get real, I know myself and there's no way I'm dropping that much cash to buy full sizes of everything in the set. But, now knowing that the serums last so much longer than the other products, I'd just go full size on each of them. I like the face lotion too, but since it doesn't have the sunscreen in it I'm not really willing to do that extra step every day. And while I love the facewash, I don't think I'll spring for it. I was just listening to an episode of Bad On Paper Podcast where they had the founder of Allure on to chat all things beauty. She said that she goes drugstore for things that will stay on your face a short amount of time, and higher end for things that sit on your skin for longer. So since facewash just gets rinsed off immediately, you don't need to make sure it's the best possible ingredients for your skin. Makes sense!

Have you tried Drunk Elephant? What's your skincare philosophy? 

(Just a note in case you were wondering - nope nope this isn't sponsored! Just something I wanted to try and share with you.)

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