What's your take on pore cleaning strips?

I have used them before and all of my three girls used them as teens. They work very well. An alternative would be to get a good facial scrub and use it daily. Exfoliating some of the dead skin off will open up and clean out these pores. St. Ives makes a good one that is under $5.00. Let us know which one you choose and how it is working. Of course, you will need to give this some time. Miracles don't happen overnight!

Pore cleaning strips in all reality rip the top layer of the dermis, which would include black heads and white heads. I personally don't like them and don't think to work them effective. Blackheads are black due to dirt on the skin. If you were to wash your face regularly with a salicylic scid treatment (i love Murad's acne cleanser) or an exfoliating pad (Peter Thomas Roth exfoliating pads work great) then this should help the problem. Doing this little by little will give a better result then just tring to rip it off.

I've tried the Biore pore cleaning strips but they never did much for me. I could see some stuff on it when I pulled it off but I didn't notice any difference on my nose. I haven't tried any other products yet. It's so funny you started this discussion because I was just thinking about what I could use.

I have used those strips before and they don't really seem to do much for me. I do see some stuff on the strip, but it did not make a really noticable difference for me.

I got a Clean and Clear Blackhead Eraser. It seems to work fairly well. I don't use it every day because it was drying out my skin. I still have blackheads, but this thing makes my skin feel a lot smoother.


http://www.cleanandclear.com/blackheaderaser/?channelFull=09CNCSGGLBBHE01&gclid=CK3h8vCu6ZgCFSHyDAodpzw72A

Every few years I buy these and usually use one while the rest just float around from basket to basket in the bathroom. I usually have at least one pimple and you aren't supposed to use them on actual acne so I'm SOL. I like to put them on the fiance every now and then though just to see. It's pretty gross!

What I have found works the best is to do a facial steam (either with a steamer or just by covering your head with a towel and sticking your face over a pot of hot water) for about ten minutes and then use an exfoliator. I like Biore's pore refining scrub (and their pore mimimizing moisturizer in the AM - it's a good one). I usually do that on Sunday and Wednesday night, if my skin is on the dry side I'll skip the scrub. It's also a good idea to use a salicylic acid based acne gel if it agrees with your skin, it's the best for black heads. Also stick to moisturizers and make up that say non-comedogenic on the label.

If you don't want to spring for the products one thing to try is the fabled 'aspirin mask'. Take 3 non-coated aspirin and put a few drops of water on them to soften. Crush them up as fine as you can and then mix the powder with honey and massage into your face, leave it on for about 10 minutes. It's a scrub and a mask that seems to work ok, nice and moisturizing while still exfoliating. Best to only use it once a week.

I use the Biore strips and they have always worked for me. I see lots of stuff it was pulled off and my nose doesn't look as bad. I also use a daily scrub every other day. Unfortunately I have discovered that the pollution in Phoenix really makes me break out (I had clearer skin when I lived up north) and wish I could figure out how to deal with that.

hello katsmeow

oh the dreaded black head problem. lol i as well have black heads like that all over my nose area. and years ago, i think that i had recieved a free sample of the nose strips that you use like that to get rid of them all. the strips cleaned the black heads off of my nose, and they actually stuck to the cleaning strip. when i pulled the strip off of my nose, they were on the strip and that looked really gross. lol i had seen a Mylot discussion that somebody started awhile back and they said that they used elmer's white glue to put on their nose like that, then they let it dry, and peeled it off to solve their black head problems on their nose like that. ewww. looks like that would hurt peeling dried glue off of your nose like that. whatever that works. years ago, i used Noxzema all over my face to keep my black heads at bay, it is a good inexpensive product to use.

take care and have a beautiful afternoon.

Black heads are something I battle too. One thing I learned with those pore strips is to make sure your face is washed first. If you have makeup or oil on your face the strips won't stick to the blackheads so they don't work as well. I was also told by a dermatologist years ago not to try and "pop" the blackheads because it makes the pores even larger. They do make different brands of things you can use to shrink pores - I've just never been able to justify buying it. I can tell you one thing that has helped me is I quit using liquid makeup. I use Sheer Cover and I love the stuff. I know they now have other powdered makeups now that probably work just as well.

I've tried them before and use them off and on. I think they work fairly well but they certainly don't catch everything especially for me. It clears some of my poors and then leaves other poors rather clogged up. I don't like buying them all the time because those things are rather expensive for the amount of strips they you get.

I have never used pore cleaning strips. I have always used apricot scrub, and that works pretty weel for me.
If you wash your face with warm water to open your pores, rinse well, and then splash your face with cool water, the cool water will help to shrink your pores.