I can’t be the only person who automatically thinks, Score! when staying the night at a friend’s house and discovering that they have a superb collection of beauty products. I mean, I’m not using their face cream or going through their medicine cabinet. I’m here for the shower selection. I brought my own face cream, but I did not haul my jugs, cans, and tubes of shampoo, conditioner, shaving cream, and face washes all the way to wherever just for a weekend trip. And the product I have always been most excited to see, for as long as I can remember, is the St. Ives Fresh Skin Apricot Scrub.
It’s like a universal signal that you’re in for a good shower. Maybe it’s because my no-nonsense parents bought the most basic of everything — V05 shampoo and conditioner, off-brand soap. A name-brand product and a scrub at that (not a necessity by my parents' standards) seemed like the height of luxury. I first discovered it in my grandmother’s guest bathroom when I was a child. She was beautiful and elegant and European, so I attributed all those qualities to the scrub, too.
Satisfyingly scrubby, apricot-scented, and just a little creamy, it was the closest thing I’d ever experienced to a facial. My skin looked so ... polished. In other showers over the years (while housesitting or visiting friends in faraway cities), I’ve even massaged it on in place of face cleanser (although, it's important to note that most dermatologists recommend you don't use a scrub this gritty on a daily basis — once or twice a week is ideal). It doesn’t do a terrible job of taking off makeup, for the record. But now that I’m a beauty editor, I know what makes the magic happen: walnut-shell powder (impressive in a scrub created way ahead of the anti-microbead movement), aromatic apricot fruit extract, and skin-conditioning glycerin. Still, I can't help but be excited when I see it in someone else’s shower … even though it’s sitting in my own.
