My name's Emily. I'm a freelance beauty writer with a special place in my heart for testing new, weird, and fun beauty products, trends, and DIYs. So when I heard about using Vagisil as a makeup primer recently, I couldn't stop thinking about giving it a go.
Last year, Huda Kattan tried a couple of unlikely drugstore items as makeup primers, including laxative, lube and Vagisil. She praised Vagisil's results, leaving me incredibly curious.
Still anxious about it, I got a professional take on the risks. "It is probably not dangerous to apply to your face," says dermatologist Dr. Doris Day. However, she notes that it will make your face numb for about 15-30 minutes.
Just to be safe, you should always do a patch test on your arm, which I did. When rubbing it in I noticed that it didn't feel numb, but did feel weird– rough and grainy. No way would this work as a makeup primer.
Confused by the texture, I remembered something: the main ingredient dimethicone was the reason Kattan liked Vagisil as a primer. I double-checked the back of my Vagisil box to find that there's actually no dimethicone in it, because Huda was using the SENSITIVE SKIN version. My local store only had the regular tube, so I settled on Monistat Complete Care Instant Itch Relief Cream which had the ingredients I needed.
Okay, so let's try this again. Dr. Doris Day said of Monistat's cream, "It's really no better an option." The main ingredient, hydrocortisone, she explains, "if used incorrectly it can cause redness, thinning of the skin and increased risk of infection." As for the dimethicone, "it's readily available in many products including primers that are designed to be primers."
Aware of the risks, I decided to still give it a go. If Huda (and many other people) tested it just once and found it to be fine, I figured with the small 1% of hydrocortisone I could give it one go. When I did an arm test first, the texture was incredibly smooth and I had no irritation.
With all the complications squared away, I was ready to get started. I wanted to see how the Monistat cream held up against Kattan's new primer since the product was inspired by this little experiment. So I decided to apply each product to one half of my face.
Huda Beauty's Complextion Perfection naturally smelled better and felt creamier, but I actually found it to be a bit thicker than I'd like.
I liked how thinly and evenly the Monistat cream rubbed across the surface of my face. It felt less like I was wearing a mask.
