Beauteque Mask Maven is a monthly k-beauty subscription box dedicated to masks. If you love trying new Korean sheet masks, this subscription is for you!
My Subscription Addiction paid for this box. (Check out the review process post to learn more about how we review boxes.)
About Beauteque Mask Maven
The Subscription Box: Beauteque Mask Maven
The Cost: $18.95 month-to-month ($15 subscription + $3.95 shipping), save with 6- and 12-month subscriptions
ACTIVE DEAL: Save 10% off of your subscription
CODE: SHEETFACED
The Products: 9 to 11 masks of all kinds, straight from Korea. Most are facial sheet masks, but you will sometimes see a hair mask or hand mask or lip mask, too.
Ships to: USA, Canada, Europe, Australia, and parts of Asia (see international shipping costs during checkout)
Beauteque Mask Maven May 2018 Review
The number of sheet masks out there for sale must be incredibly large. Mask Maven almost never sends repeat items, and I discover something new every month:
The box came with this information card. This month, all the masks have something to do with the ocean. (They did a better job of sticking to a theme this month than usual.)
Annie’s Way Hyaluronic Acid + Seaweed Mask – Retail Value $2.99
Like most of the other Annie’s Way masks in this type of packaging, this had so much serum it dripped all over my t-shirt. Not an issue as I was going to change afterward, but just something to keep in mind. This is mostly meant to be moisturizing but I also found it somewhat cooling. The key ingredients are hyaluronic acid (a carbohydrate polymer that holds on to water near the surface of the skin, leading to a reduced appearance of fine lines) and seaweed, which has vitamins, minerals, and other polymers that act in a similar way to hyaluronic acid. This did not have a noticeable scent.
Medi Flower Black Pearl Mask – Retail Value $3
I feel like the purpose of this one is brightening, even though the package says it is moisturizing (there’s no reason it can’t be both at once). Pearl extracts have long been claimed to be whitening or brightening (ground up pearl powder wouldn’t penetrate the skin, but extracted compounds *might*). This also has niacinamide, which reduces redness, and several plant extracts (strawberry, cranberry, green tea) that are known to contain antioxidants, which may help prevent sun damage to the skin when used regularly. This does also have moisturizing ingredients like hydrolyzed collagen and is not vegan (collagen can never be vegan, but don’t forget where pearls come from, either).
Mediheal Eggy Skin Mask Aqua – Retail Value $3
OK, if I thought the Annie’s Way mask was drippy, this is the Annie’s Way mask on steroids. There was SO MUCH serum here. The product page says it uses 80% eggshell, but eggshells are mostly calcium carbonate, which is not soluble in water. So I think maybe they are referring to inner membranes or egg white/yolk proteins, and something was lost in translation. This is just absolutely full of amino acids and moisturizing compounds like sodium hyaluronate (see note on hyaluronic acid above).
Skinfood Marine Gel Mask Seaweed – Retail Value $3.99
There’s always one mask that’s a little different or unusual and I’d say it’s this one, this month. This was a two piece hydrogel mask and I really had a hard time getting it to stay on my face. These types of masks usually have a little less serum left over on the skin when you are done using them, and I found that to be true here. This one has a lot of plant-based gums and thickeners (should be moisturizing) as well as grapefruit extract and algae extract, both of which should contain vitamins and antioxidants.
Medi Flower Glacier Water Mask – Retail Value $3
I used this one when I took a long bath yesterday (trying to clear out my sinuses with eucalyptus bath oil, which did not end up working as I had hoped) and I found it cooling and soothing. It has a lot of moisturizing ingredients like sodium hyaluronate and plant-based thickeners like carrageenan, algin, agar, etc., but I am not sure that it is vegan because most sodium hyaluronate comes from poultry and fish processing. (But, you should never expect K-beauty products to be vegan. Some are, but most aren’t.) I don’t really feel the glacier water did much that regular water wouldn’t do (maybe it had a few more dissolved minerals or fewer pollutants or something). But this one was gentle and I think it’d be good for repeated use (even daily).
Healing Bird Botanical Face Mask Jojoba – Retail Value $1.99
This mask takes a little bit of a different approach when it comes to moisturizing ingredients, compared to the rest of the shipment. It has agave extract, which contains inulin, which can be a sweetener and also a probiotic (that is, it provides a nice environment for healthy gut bacteria), but which is, ultimately, a long carbohydrate polymer that holds on to water near the surface of the skin. It also has jojoba, which, while a common moisturizer, really doesn’t appear in many of the products this month. I don’t think I can really say much about skin elasticity after only one use, but this one is inexpensive and would be suitable for daily use. So I guess you could easily find out if that was a concern of yours (I’m not really at a point in my life where I feel that I have skin elasticity issues).
The Face Shop Real Nature Mask Kelp – Retail Value $1.99
I don’t know what “varech” means and when I Googled it, it took me to a Wikipedia page in French, so I think it may just be the French word for this type of seaweed, or for seaweed in general, or possibly for edible seaweed. At any rate, I discussed seaweed a bit up above and that all holds true here, as well. The kelp extract is also supposed to help tone the skin and I think I did kind of feel that, although not as dramatically as with a separate toner.
Esfolio Pure Skin Pearl Essence Mask – Retail Value $2.20
This has something called “hatch extract” but just try looking that up – very few of the search results have anything to do with skincare (or they might have to do with stretch marks and pregnancy). This also has an ingredient called “ethanol-based paraben flavoring,” and I don’t even know what that means because it combines like three different concepts in cosmetic products into one phrase. I think it may be a typo. (I wonder if they mean “fragrance,” first of all, because I don’t care if my sheet masks have flavoring…) The main ingredients here are pearl extract and sodium hyaluronate, which I discussed above. This is another gentle one and the essence absorbed into my skin fairly quickly after use.
9cc Sea Collagen Heben Mask – Retail Value $3.99
This one has a more diverse ingredients list than a lot of the rest of the items in this shipment. It does have pearl extract and niacinamide (for brightening), but it also has milk protein, rice bran, and a bean fermentation product, all of which will add proteins, amino acids, and vitamins. It also has witch hazel, which will help with toning the skin, and hydrolyzed collagen as well as various plant-based lipids for moisture (e.g., phytosphingosine, phytosterols). If you like your skincare to multitask, this is one to consider (probably also all the separate ingredients are why it costs more than some of the others in this shipment). (And no, no idea what “Heben” means and Google was not helpful. It is a German verb meaning “to lift.")
Verdict: I calculated a value of $26.15 for the May 2018 Beauteque Mask Maven. That’s above average for this subscription and it is quite a few dollars above the cost of the subscription on a month-to-month basis (there are a lot of coupons and sales, allowing you to bring the price down even further). I thought the theme this month was fun and that Beauteque did a great job of sticking to it (maybe we are starting to see a trend since that happened last month as well). It was mostly moisture, which I might like to see again in the winter time as my winter skin definitely suffers more from dryness than I do in the summertime. Once again, everything was new to me.
To Wrap Up:
Can you still get this box if you sign up today? No, you have to sign up by the 15th to get a box for the month, so your first box would probably come near the end of June.
Coupon – Save 10% off your subscription with code SHEETFACED
Value Breakdown: At $18.95 for this box, you are paying approximately the following per item:
- Annie’s Way Mask: $2.17
- Black Pearl Mask: $2.17
- Eggy Skin Mask: $2.17
- Seaweed Gel Mask: $2.89
- Glacier Water Mask: $2.17
- Jojoba Mask: $1.44
- Face Shop Kelp Mask: $1.44
- Pearl Essence Mask: $1.59
- 9cc Mask: $2.89
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What did you think of the May Beauteque Mask Maven?
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