Nature Republic Lemon Foot & Nature Peeling Foot Mask

Yuck, this post contains many pictures of my yucky peeling foot so it deserves a post all by itself. You have been warned!! From the beginning! That there will be gross closeups on my feet! Don't proceed if you are easily grossed out!!! YOU BEEN WARNED!!! (＊☉౪ ⊙｡)

Okay, let's start. I have been using a few foot peel masks in the past year or two. My favourite is the Tonymoly Shiny Foot Super Peeling Liquid that I bought as one of my first Korean skincare/body care products. I was very impressed with the result! It took off so much of this big callus that I had on my left foot. I love its result but hate its cost. Especially with the declining Canadian dollar, they cost about $11 CAD per use. That's a little expensive even for a item that I use maybe twice or thrice a year. I am also not fond of its strong chemical smell that would linger in my mouth, even though it's actually soaking my feet.

The other foot peeling mask I tried was the Mizon Magic Peeling Foot mask that I received from Memebox. You can see the review here.  RoseRoseshop doesn't seem to carry it anymore so I am assuming it is probably discontinued. It's a good thing too, as I found it did nothing to my feet besides making it super dry.

I heard good reviews for Nature Republic Lemon Foot & Nature Peeling Foot Mask and it was about $3.50 USD so I decided to buy it to make up the weight for one of my hauls. Sadly it looks like Nature Republic has discontinued the product. They now have a new version of peeling foot mask with aloe vera instead.

 Ingredients: As per the package. 

Alcohol, Water, Propylene Glycol, Lactic Acid, Isopropyl Alcohol, Urea, Glycolic Acid, Betaine, Anthemis Nobilis Flower Extract, Citrus Limon (Lemon) Fruit Extract, Carica Papaya (Papaya) Fruit Extract, Pyrus Malus (Apple) Fruit Extract, Citrus Aurantium Dulcis (Orange) Fruit Extract, Triclosan, Salicylic Acid, Menthol, PEG-60 Hydrogenated Castor Oil, Disodium EDTA, Sea Water, Fragrance

Hmm, I am surprised to see so much fruit extract in a foot mask! Though I don't like seeing alcohol listed as the first ingredients. Oh well, at least it's not going on my face. 

The masks comes in two sealed booties that has a plastic shell, mesh lining and liquid solution. My advice for this pair of booties is to cut well below the "cut line". I cut right on the line and I could not open it at all. Had to cut further down to open it. 

As mentioned above, each bootie has the liquid solution inside. The liquid has a chemical smell to it, most likely due to the alcohol. Though it isn't as strong the Tonymoly version. The bootie is not that big. As you can see above, my size 6 foot is just comfy in it. I can't imagine it being able to fit someone with a shoe size over 8. 

My problem with these booties is that there was no tape to close it shut! Because there is quite a bit of free flowing liquid in the booties, I prefer to have it taped shut to prevent possible spillage. I wasn't smart enough to foresee this problem and had to roam around with the booties on while trying to find tape. 

Couple of advice for wearing these booties. 

1) After taping up your booties, wear a pair of socks over them. Preferably a pair of socks you don't normally wear, I'll explain why at the end. This allows you to move around without fearing any step will break open the tape and your foot will slip out of the bootie. 

2) Remove your nail polish before doing this. I learned it the hard way. I had this really nice black base + silver glitter top going in, it came out looking like the mold I found in my Julep eyeliner. So unless you want your manicure to be ruined, do it afterwards! 

The instructions said to leave it on for 60 - 90 minutes but I tend to leave it on for close to 2 hours to let it really soak. After 90 minutes my feet started to feel warm. So I decided to take it off after an hour and 40 minutes as it was starting to get really uncomfortable. 

When I took off the booties, my feet were RED. Probably from a combination of the solution and the fact that it was enclosed in a bag for over an hour. My feet smelled like menthol as I was rinsing off the solution, which makes sense since menthol is listed in the ingredients. Which also explains why my feet felt cool as well. After I finished rinsing it off, my feel smelled BAD. It is this unpleasant fermented smell that is so strong that I can smell it while sitting in a chair. 

I did put on foot cream and socks on after I dried off my feet, but now I wonder if that was the wrong move. 

Okay.. So gross feet pictures are coming!! Press "End" on your keyboard and read the final thoughts now!!!! 

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Enough spacing, now for the ugly feet pictures! 

Left foot on top, and right foot on bottom. My feet are super dry as I prefer walking around my place bare feet and always forget to put some cream on them. For some reason my left foot is much more drier than the right foot. There's that thick callus below the pinkie toe. I managed to get rid a bit of it with Tonymoly's foot peel. 

I am truly sorry for these GROSS pictures of my feet, but you have been warned!!! This is 6 days after I used the foot peel. As you can see, only a little bit has peeled under my right toes, there wasn't much action going on on my left foot. *Sorry about the dirty feet, but I washed my feet prior to taking the photos but they just wouldn't come off. May have been due to the skin being so dry? 

The pictures are a little deceptive as there were a bit of skin coming off in patches throughout the week. The packaging does say DO NOT TRY TO PEEL OFF THE SKIN! But I am a rebel and I do it anyways. The chunks that come off are very little, they are nothing compared to the big patches I get from Tonymoly. 

After a bit over a week, this is how my feet looks like. They are much softer than before but you can still see some dry patches on my feet. The mask didn't take off much dead skin from the heels and not much was done to the callus. Most of the dead skin comes from the ball and the sole of my feet. 

Overall Thoughts

Well, I can't say I am too disappointed with the product. It did what it is supposed to do. Not as great of a result as I was looking for but it cost less than $5 so you get what you paid for I guess. I got another pair that I am planning to use in spring time, just before sandal season. But I don't think I'll buy it again. I think I would rather spend the money and get the good ol' Tonymoly Shiny Foot masks. 

Now a little caution to using socks with these peeling masks. Two weeks ago, I noticed my feet were really dry but chalked it up to the dry weather. But when I actually looked at my feet, I realized it wasn't due to the dry weather at all. The ball of my feet had patches of skin ready to fall off, and the heel was just a big giant patch of dry skin, ready to come off in little chunks. It definitely looked like it was day 5 or something of a foot peel. But I haven't done a foot peel for over a month. Then I realized, I must have accidentally worn the socks I used to secure the booties. The most likely scenario is that the solution leaked from the bootie and I did not realize my socks are soaked in the solution and essentially soaked my feet in the solution again. Yuck I know, but no harm was done to my feet. 

Hope you enjoyed reading my review on the Nature Republic lemon foot peel, even with the gross pictures! Do you have any recommendations for a good foot peeling mask that is cheap but comparable with the Tonymoly Shiny Feet masks?