Recently, in the past two months or so, I had the change of mind to try some indie brand bath and body companies. To actually go outside of Lush for some bath & shower products, which I’d never done in 17 years.

Let me say it again. I’ve never used anything else but Lush Uk products in 17 years.

While I’ve always loved non lush companies like Black Phoenix Alchemy labs, for their oils, and The Bathing Garden for scrubs, I’d not really ventured out in the *tub* arena.

Truthfully, I had just never had the time to venture outside Lush because lush had become a full time job of sorts. And also, I was spending a fair bit of cash on Lush and simply didn’t have extra for other companies.

It just seemed to me that nothing could compare to Lush.

However I decided to change this way of thinking after seeing a photo of a product from the company ‘Happy Place Cosmetics’.

And this occurred at a time when there was a ‘Lush drought’ as I call it. (I was weak?) I had become so used to my weekly order of 10 Lush Kitchen goodies that when lush decided to close the lush kitchen and all this abrubtly stopped I had withdrawal. And I was agitated about it.

Happy Place Cosmetics had shower and bath whips in Lush dupe scents that were apparently so close to the real thing it was amazing, from all accounts.

‘Superb Lush dupes’ is all that stood out while I eyed my severely dwindling lush shower gel collection.

So I pulled the trigger and placed an order.

I was so completely blown away by the products, that it made me have the realization that maybe I *could* trust other brands. I could trust them not to let me down.

Let’s face it, I had a high bar, because of Lush.

So while I gobbled up (in the bath sense) every one of those beautiful bath and shower whips that the Uk based company Happy Place Cosmetics makes, I placed an order to the next company I was curious about’. Mostly because the name had come up in my periphery multiple times.

Here are some photos I’ve taken of my Happy Place Cosmetics orders and my Haul video on youtube.

So…on the ‘Bath Bake Love’ site now I see some pretty delicious looking bath treats. I see something called ‘creme brulee blueberry.. rub me all over your body and maybe try to accidently taste some from the container first because you never know *this* one could actually taste like it looks’.

Yeah twist my arm, I placed an order.

Thus began my entry (and haphazard decent) into the indie bath vendor realm.

Soon I began to actually LOOK for other indie bath vendors on my own, not relying on my periphery of my social media feeds.

And, as naturally I would, I began to discover the fans of those companies.

And it reminded me of when Lush was an indie company back in the day.

And I began to notice, via these folks, that these indie companies would have monthly offerings or ‘updates’ as they call them. And that many of these newly found indie bath vendors had themes to their monthly output of bath treats.

I’m not made of wood people.

I placed another order.

This time with ‘Mad Bear Beauty’.

This one had broken the chain!

It was a U.S. company!

I’d fucking forgotten what it was like to order from a company that was in the same country that I was.

I translated the total to U.S. dollars five times before I figure out that it already WAS in U.S. dollars.

Both Bath Bake Love and Happy Place Cosmetics are Uk based. And I’ve ordered only from lush Uk for the past 17 years.

Because I must have some subconscious pull to the Uk or something, because I always wind up buying from UK companies and I live in the United States!

But THIS time I had found Mad Bear Beauty…

To be Continued tomorrow.

These photos below are of my Mad Bear Beauty orders.

Here is my Mad Bear Beauty Haul Video on Youtube.

➡️ Its tomorrow now, June 18, so I’ll continue.

What I noticed right away about Mad Bear Beauty products was the artistry of her bath bombs. She paints them. I had never seen bath bombs with such vivid, saturated, colors and artistic, painted designs.

Now These were bath bombs for bath art.

Some of you Instagram Lushies know the term bath art, but those of you not on Instagram may not. Bath art is when the bath bomb is made in such a way as to produce multiple swirls of color, shades, shapes and texture in the water as it fizzed down, creating pleasing artistic patterns which some Lushies (myself included) like to photograph. Lush often used the tag #bathart on Instagram.

Apparently, the owner of Mad Bear Beauty had grocked the whole bath art concept because her bombs put on a show stopping array of colorful designs.

Bright colors, metallic (food grade) paints, glitter, and whimsical shapes.

The price point is good at an average of between $6.25-$7.95 per bath 150g-250g bath bomb.

In my opinion you MUST try her waffle bomb in partcular (or Tardis bomb if you live in the Uk 😂). It is the epitome of bath art!

The scents were different than what I was used to, but they are indeed both yummy and pretty.

I placed a total of two orders at Mad Bear Beauty and bought around ten bombs in total.

I had just placed my SECOND non Lush order. I looked at my receipt with a combination of glee and shame. It felt..foreign..developing a fascination for a company that wasn’t Lush.

It almost felt like cheating. I chuckled at myself for having this strange feeling.

Then, after discovering that I had missed these lovely things called ‘bath syrups’ the *first* time I placed an order, I placed my second order from Bath Bake Love.

Bath Bake Love is a company that sells bath products that look and smell as if they come from a bakery. Very Rhoald Dahl’s Chocolate Factory. Yummy. Whimsical, with some elegance.

Another thing about me. I love whimsical.

If you like foody, bakery scented products Bath Bake Love is your place. There’s just something to be said about rubbing strawberry jam or creme brulee all over yourself in a warm shower.

Below are my photos of my Bath Bake Love orders and my haul video Youtube.

Next I began to look for more Etsy bath companies who had a presence on Instagram, and found a company called Rock Oil Naturals. Pleased that I’d found two U.S. bath and body vendors in a row (do you get a sense of my Indie naivete?) I quickly went to her bath bomb area.

The bombs I saw at Rock Oil Naturals seemed to have a music theme. I notice her bombs names were titles of classic songs.

Right. Up. My. Alley.

There was one that I put in my cart first; ‘one toke over the line’ in a bomb with a cannabis flower on it, containing hemp oil.

Rock Oil bombs have a range of sizes. She has great fun shapes and designs. I bought an all gold bath bomb with an Egyptian eye of Horus on it called ‘Walk Like an Egyptian’ made with orange oil that smelled wonderful and spewed tons of gold shimmer into the bath! I ordered about 6-8 different bombs from Rock Oil. The bombs don’t skimp on essential oils. And she also has a definite artistry in her bath bombs, having interesting, pretty and dainty details like glitter edged raised designs on square bombs and even more fun, bold things like giant dinosaurs!

They are located in the U.S. and the price point is good and ranges from $5.25 for a 100g bomb-$15.00 for a giant 1lb bath bomb!
Here are some photos of my rock oil naturals orders and my haul video on youtube.

➡️ Part 2 is here 😊♥️ ⬅️