PRODUCT REVIEW: MAYSAMA ABP11+ GREEN ROOIBOS GENTLE RESURFACING TONER - BEST TREATMENT TONER WITH LACTIC ACID, BEST EXFOLIATING TONER
MAYSAMA BEAUTY | ABP11+ GREEN ROOIBOS GENTLE RESURFACING TONER
About a year or so ago, I was having a conversation with a biologist and our in-depth chat turned to the skin, skin aging, and the role that antioxidants play in the health of our skin. Antioxidants have always fascinated me. My question to her: Is there such a thing as too many antioxidants in a skincare routine? I really wanted to know!
Back in the early days when I was working at Kiehl’s in New York City, antioxidants were universally believed to be important to only younger skin; they weren’t necessarily essential for everyone. Big beauty was marketing antioxidant-infused products to skincare consumers in their 20s; more mature people needed more serious anti-aging skincare — whatever that meant. It was such nonsense. Today, it’s common knowledge that antioxidants play a crucial role in our overall body heath and, more specifically, in the health of our skin.
While the biologist didn’t have the definitive answer to my question about the amount of antioxidants skin needs to maintain optimal health, we agreed that you can’t get enough antioxidants in your daily skincare routine. The skin will use what it needs — and it needs antioxidants in abundance. What it doesn’t need, it will expel as waste like the rest of the body so efficiently does.
When people ask me about my skincare essentials, I always mention the importance of a really well-formulated antioxidant serum morning and night. Even two or three of them!
There are multiple antioxidants with proven efficacy — some in the form of vitamins, others botanical extracts. Among my go-to’s are, of course, Vitamin C and Niacinamide (Vitamin B3). I consider each essential to my daily skincare routines.
While I alternate every day between what I consider the best Vitamin C serums, some water-based, others oil-based, my go-to daily Niacinamide serum is nearly always the Paula’s Choice 10% Niacinamide Booster. But that’s not to say there aren’t numerous well-formulated Niacinamide serums out there.
For my collection of the best Niacinamide serums for face, check out the rundown here.
The Best Niacinamide Serums and Treatments
Most vitamins are powerful antioxidants that protect skin from free radical damage while defending it against aging. In fact, antioxidants are anti-aging. The marketers at Kiehl’s and elsewhere didn’t know what they didn’t know, so I can’t fault them.
The true power and essential nature of antioxidants just wasn’t commonly understood at the time.
What Are Antioxidants and What Do Antioxidants Do for Skin?
Antioxidants possess numerous benefits for the skin, including preventing skin damage and multiple signs of aging. There’s an excellent article from the experts on the Paula’s Choice Research Team titled, How Antioxidants Fight the Signs of Aging that you can catch here.
This is what I found most insightful:
Antioxidants for Skin Benefits
Antioxidants play a unique role when it comes to diminishing the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles. Years of environmental damage (including unprotected sun exposure—one more reason to apply that broad-spectrum sunscreen!) slowly chip away at skin’s natural ability to look and feel healthy. As this damage builds up, skin gradually loses its ability to recover and bounce back as it once did. It’s not an exaggeration to say that after years of damage, skin becomes overwhelmed, and its “look young systems” begin to slow down.
Antioxidants in skin care step in to help shield skin’s surface from further deterioration by calming stressed skin and defending against the visible effects of pollution —something all of us encounter on a daily basis.
What happens as a result of applying antioxidants to your face is truly impressive: Skin’s appearance begins to turn around! It regains a firmer feel and more even skin tone—and those wrinkles you’re probably not fond of will visibly soften.
Around the same time as the conversation with the biologist, I stumbled upon this incredible antioxidant serum that I still can’t get enough of. It’s been a daily staple in my morning routine for well over a year now. From indie brand Maysama, the Green Rooibos Pressed Serum is a next-level antioxidant treatment, infused with potent rooibos extract.
In the year since my fateful discovery, Maysama has launched two additional products. Maysama’s Green Rooibos Brightening Mask is an excellent brightening mask and an ideal option for #selfcaresunday. It eradicates dullness and leaves my skin feeling supremely pampered.
And recently, Maysama introduced a very well-formulated treatment toner, the ABP11+ Green Rooibos Gentle Resurfacing Toner. As with the other products in the Maysama range, it’s infused with Green Rooibos Tea Extract, in addition to a skin-refining blend of AHA/BHA/PHA acids — 5% Lactic Acid, 1% Salicylic Acid and 5% Gluconolactine, a naturally occurring polyhydroxy acid (PHA) that is then most gentle on the skin. (Psst…if you’re sensitive, PHA’s are the way to go!)
Let’s have a look at one of the best exfoliating toners I’ve come across — the Maysama ABP11+ Green Rooibos Gentle Resurfacing Toner.
Maysama Beauty | ABP11+ Green Rooibos Gentle Resurfacing Toner
I first featured Maysama ABP11+ Green Rooibos Gentle Resurfacing Toner on my Instagram page #skincarmasaturday — a sneak peek at my skincare discoveries of the week. This extra-ordinary treatment toner is a real standout and is among the best exfoliating toners that I’ve tried.
My most recent deep dive into the best treatment toners was last summer in an article titled, Acid Toners – Some of the Best BHA / AHA Toners for Face From Paula's Choice, Farmacy And More. The extensive piece featured two of my all-time favorite acid toners: the Farmacy Deep Sweep 2% BHA Pore Cleaning Toner with Moringa + Papaya and Paula’s Choice Skin Perfecting 2% BHA Liquid Exfoliant — one of the best toners with Salicylic Acid for oily skin.
ACID TONERS – SOME OF THE BEST BHA / AHA TONERS FOR FACE FROM PAULA'S CHOICE, FARMACY AND MORE
What Is Polyhydroxy Acid and How do PHA’s Work?
Polyhydroxy Acids, or PHA’s, are the latest acid rage in skincare. Many of us (yours truly included!) are guilty of overdoing it with harsh acids like Glycolic Acid. Instead of educating that overuse of acids can sensitize the skin, marketers seized on the fear of many consumers that their skin is sensitive. Most people don’t have sensitive skin; rather, their skin is sensitized.
So, here comes the class of gentler acids called Polyhydroxy Acids, or PHA’s. With long, scientific, and even futuristic names like Gluconolactone, Lactobionic Acid and Galactose, PHA’s have a milder exfoliating benefit and can even help to rehydrate the skin.
I found an insightful piece on the Healthline website titled, Brainy Beauty: What Can PHAs Really Do for Your Skin? Here’s what I found most salient:
Countless beauty brands spend billions every year to make products that “smooth away” wrinkles — with sometimes impressive but always limited results. Polyhydroxy acids (PHAs) are one of the latest trendy beauty ingredients touted to banish fine lines.
Older studies do suggest that PHAs can help hydrate skin and boost skin cell regeneration, which helps reduce the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles. Compared to similar exfoliating ingredients, they’re less irritating, especially if you have sensitive skin.
Here’s what you need to know about PHAs, including how they work, how to use them, and where to find them.
The facts:
Aging has multiple effects on your skin: The epidermis (i.e., the skin’s outermost layer) thickens. The skin holds in less moisture and contains less collagen. Sun exposure further damages cellular DNA. Together, these factors increase the appearance of wrinkles.
PHAs are a chemical exfoliant.
“Exfoliation helps to slough away dead, dull-looking cells, reveal healthy cells, reduce hyperpigmentation, and improve skin texture,” says Dr. Dendy Engelman, a dermatologist practicing at Shafer Clinic in New York City.
PHAs also hydrate skin. They support the skin’s barrier function, which locks in moisture and reduces the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles.
The ingredient boasts other benefits too.
“PHAs potentially facilitate the penetration of other active ingredients applied to treated skin,” says Dr. Tsippora Shainhouse, FAAD, a board certified dermatologist in private practice at SkinSafe Dermatology and Skin Care in Beverly Hills, California.
And PHAs have antioxidant properties that “help undo and prevent UV and pollution-induced free radical damage to collagen and skin cells,” she says.
The result? PHAs have an anti-aging effect, says Shainhouse.
Maysama’s ABP11+ Green Rooibos Gentle Resurfacing Toner is made with a 77% acid complex comprising 5% Lactic Acid (AHA), 1% Salicylic Acid (BHA) and a 5% concentration of PHA Gluconolactone — one of the most gentle exfoliating acids on par with Mandelic Acid, the mildest of the alpha hydroxy acids.
Perhaps the most noteworthy characteristic of the ABP11+ Green Rooibos Gentle Resurfacing Toner is its wonderfully aromatic scent. It smells like freshly brewed tea, likely the result of the high content of tea extracts in the formula, including Kombucha (Black Tea Ferment) and the brand’s signature Aspalathin-enriched Green Rooibos Tea Extract.
It’s like a cuppa pure heaven. In fact, it feels like heaven on the skin. To test any sensitizing effect, I’ve used it twice daily over several days and never noticed anything but a bright, healthy complexion.
You’ve got to experience the Maysama ABP11+ Green Rooibos Gentle Resurfacing Toner for yourself…
SHOP THE BLOG: For a limited time, save 10% on all skin care from Maysama Beauty with code SKINCARMA10. (Discount automatically applied at checkout.) Purchase the Maysama ABP11+ Green Rooibos Gentle Resurfacing Toner for $59.36 (reg. 65.95) here.
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The Ingredient List of the Maysama Green Rooibos Pressed Serum:
so|h, Aqua solv, Niacinamide (3%) 
cci|sb|aacne|h, Glycerin sii|h 0 0, Aspalathus Linearis (Green Rooibos) Leaf Extract (1.3%), Citric Acid buff, Lysolecithin emu, Sclerotium Gum vc, Cannabis Sativa (Hemp) Seed Oil emo, Sodium Benzoate pres, Pullulan, Xanthan Gum vc|emu|surf, Centella Asiatica Leaf Extract, Sodium Hyaluronate sii|h 0 0, Adansonia Digitata (Baobab) Seed Oil emo, Potassium Sorbate pres, Tocopherol aox 0-3 0-3, Argania Spinosa (Argan) Kernel Oil aox|emo, Sodium Phytate chel, Ubiquinone aox, Glycine Soja Oil emo|perf 0 3, Silica vc, Hydroxypropyl Cyclodextrin , Hippophae Rhamnoides (Sea Buckthorn) Fruit Extract, Curcuma Longa (Turmeric) Root Extract aox|so|sb|perf, Chlorella Vulgaris Powder, Tetrahydropiperine, Glycyrrhiza Glabra (Liquorice) Root Extract so|sb, Calendula Officinalis (Marigold) Flower Extract so|aox|perf, Palmitoyl Tripeptide-38 cciThe Ingredient List of the Maysama Green Rooibos Brightening Mask:
Aqua, Aloe Barbadensis Leaf Juice, Glycerin, Niacinamide, Squalane, Tranexamic Acid, Aspalathus Linearis Leaf Extract, Alpha – Arbutin, Saccharomyces/Xylinum/Black Tea Ferment, Acrylates/C10-30 Alkyl Acrylate Crosspolymer, Phenoxyethanol, Allantoin, Sodium Hydroxide, Citric Acid, Sodium Hyaluronate, Sodium Polyglutamate, Ethylhexylglycerin, Sodium Benzoate, Potassium Sorbate.
The Ingredient List of the Maysama ABP11+ Green Rooibos Gentle Resurfacing Toner:
Aqua (Water), Aloe Barbadensis Leaf Juice, Gluconolactone, Lactic Acid, Glycerin, Sodium Hydroxide, Ascorbic Acid, Salicylic Acid, Aspalathus Linearis Leaf Extract, Saccharomyces/ Xylinum /Black Tea Ferment, Camellia Sinensis Leaf Extract, Undaria Pinnatifidia Leaf/Stem Extract, Sodium Polyacrylate, Ascorbyl Glucoside, Sodium Phytate, Citric Acid, Sorbic Acid, Sodium Benzoate, Benzyl Alcohol, Potassium Sorbate.
