Artistry Review

Brand background

Artistry is a beauty brand that was founded in the 1950’s by a married couple who sought an alternative to chemically-based makeup and skincare. Today, Artistry has an exclusive partnership with Amway and sells products in 108 countries and territories worldwide. In this Artistry review, we’ll discuss key products, key formulation, reviews from real customers, and an alternative for you to consider. 

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Key products

Artistry offers consumers hundreds of different products, including cleansers, toners, moisturizers, treatment products, serums, masks, exfoliators, anti-acne, eye care, lip care, and men’s care. Since we obviously cannot discuss all Artistry products in this review, we want to share with you the three most popular Artistry skin care products: Signature Select Brightening Amplifier and Base Serum, Advanced Creamy Foam Cleanser, and Essentials by Artistry Anti-Acne Bundle.

Artistry Signature Select Brightening Amplifier and Base Serum is said to target and treat dull, lackluster skin so that skin appears “more flawlessly radiant and revitalized, brighter and more luminous.” This product is not meant to be used alone, but rather to be mixed with up to three of Artistry’s amplifiers. 

Artistry Advanced Creamy Foam Cleanser is a rich foaming cleanser that is said to clean skin while also smoothing and hydrating skin. The Advanced Creamy Foam Cleanser was formulated to work with the Artistry Youth Xtend™ Collection.

Essentials by Artistry Anti-Acne Bundle features three products designed for those with acne-prone skin: Gel Cleanser, Anti-Acne Pore Refresher, and Anti-Acne Gel Treatment. The Gel Cleanser is said to cleanse and tone the skin while removing makeup, impurities, clogging dirt and excess oils. The Anti-Acne Pore Refresher is claimed to clean deep down within the pores to refresh skin, control oil, and improve the appearance of pores and blemishes. The Anti-Acne Gel Treatment is claimed to penetrate skin to gently purify and clarify blemishes while soothing the skin and calming redness.

Key formulation

Artistry is portrayed as a natural skin care brand, and while their products do contain natural ingredients, it’s worth noting that the product formulations consist of a number of synthetic ingredients. Just because an ingredient is synthetic does not mean it is harmful; in fact, there’s many synthetic skin care ingredients that offer numerous benefits to the skin. However, if you are looking for a 100% natural skin care brand, you won’t want to use Artistry. Below we’ll discuss the formulation details for each of the key products mentioned above. 

The formulation of Artistry’s Signature Select Brightening Amplifier and Base Serum is actually pretty basic. The majority of the formula consists of water, glycerin, synthetic emollients, and spinach leaf extract. The rest of the ingredients used in this product formulation are present in very low concentrations (less than 1%). We know this by looking at the ingredient list (which is in order of descending concentrations). All of these ingredients are listed after the preservative phenoxyethanol, which cannot be used in concentrations more than 1%.

Unfortunately, the same problem exists with Artistry’s Advanced Creamy Foam Cleanser; the ingredients that are claimed to be “key” ingredients (like oat extract and African baobab fruit extract) are present in very low concentrations. The ingredients that make up the majority of this formulation include water, glycerin, and a few surfactants. Nearly all cleansers contain surfactants because these ingredients have one end that is hydrophilic (attracted to water) and one end that is lipophilic (attracted to oil). This allows surfactants to attract and suspends oils, dirt, and other impurities that have accumulated on the skin and wash them away, leaving the skin clean. Overall, the Advanced Creamy Foam Cleanse is a pretty standard cleanser with low concentrations of key ingredients. 

While the Essentials by Artistry Anti-Acne Bundle is a popular product set, we have to say that the formulation of these products is quite disappointing. First, we have to point out a major issue with the Anti-Acne Pore Refresher and Gel Treatment: the second highest concentration ingredient in both of these formulations (after water) is denatured alcohol. A high concentration of denatured alcohol is problematic for all skin types because this type of alcohol is well known to cause skin dryness, irritation, and even disruption of the skin barrier, especially when used in high concentrations. There are some beneficial ingredients used in the Essentials by Artistry Anti-Acne Bundle, however, we believe the benefits will be counteracted by the high concentration of denatured alcohol. 

What are some alternatives to Artistry?

After reading this Artistry review, you can probably start to see there are many problems with this skin care brand. First, the “key” ingredients used in their product formulation are used in very low concentrations, which means they are likely not going to have any effect on your skin. Next, the brand uses several potentially harmful ingredients in their formulations, such as denatured alcohol and synthetic fragrances. Due to these issues, we want to recommend Formulyst as an alternative to Artistry. Formulyst is a skin care brand that maximizes the use of powerful ingredients that benefit your skin and minimizes the ingredients that might make you smell and feel nice, but don’t actually work. 

While Formulyst offers a range of skin care products for a variety of concerns, one of the brand’s most popular products is the Anti-Aging Concentrate. This fragrance free, highly concentrated formula conditions your complexion and helps reduce the appearance of age spots, wrinkles, and fine lines. This serum contains natural ingredients like squalane, green tea, vitamin C, and vitamin E. All of these ingredients provide powerful antioxidant activity, protecting the skin against environmental free radicals that are known to degrade collagen. In addition, this serum contains Matrixyl 3000, a peptide complex works to restore and maintain the skin’s youthful appearance by signaling to cells to produce more collagen. Overall, Formulyst Anti-Aging Concentrate is a multi-tasking serum that is formulated to help promote the five signs of youth – radiance, elasticity, firmness, skin tone and smoothness.